OF  CAh 


THE   SOCIAL    UNREST 


THE    SOCIAL    UNREST 


STUDIES  IN  LABOR  AND 
SOCIALIST     MOVEMENTS 


BY 


Nein  gorfe 
THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

LONDON:  MACMILLAN  &  CO..  LTD. 
1903 

All  rights  reserved 


7/ 


COPYRIGHT,    1903, 
BY  THE    MACMILLAN    COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped  January,  1903. 


Norfaooti  $«S8 

J.  S.  Gushing  &  Co.  -  Berwick  &  Smith 
Norwood  Mass.  U.S.A. 


HELEN    LAWRENCE   BROOKS 


PAGE 

PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY i 

CHAPTER 

I.     SOME  GENERALITIES 17 

II.    POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS 46 

III.  SOCIAL  UNREST 68 

IV.  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  AND  ITS  ECONOMIC  SIG- 

NIFICANCE          107 

V.    THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  144 

VI.     MAN  AND  SOCIETY  versus  MACHINERY        .        .  169 

VII.    THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY        .        .  222 

VIII.    SOCIALISM  :  HISTORY  AND  THEORY      .        .        .  258 

IX.  SOCIALISM  IN  THE  MAKING 287 

X.  FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM    ....  298 
XL    SOCIALISM  AT  WORK 313 

XII.    NEXT  STEPS 344 

XIII.    A  FINAL  QUESTION 373 

APPENDIX 381 

INDEX 385 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 


PERSONAL  AND   INTRODUCTORY 

THE  nature  of  a  good  deal  of  the  evidence  in  this 
volume  is  such  as  to  require  an  explanation  that  is 
more  personal  than  I  could  wish.  This  evidence 
may,  perhaps,  be  less  sharply  criticised  if  a  frank 
statement  about  it  is  made.  I  began,  as  do  most  stu- 
dents of  social  and  economic  questions,  with  a  too 
exclusive  study  of  books.  It  was  several  years  before 
I  learned  that  for  one  branch  of  economic  and  social 
study,  the  "  live  questions,"  like  strikes,  trade  unions, 
the  influence  of  machinery,  etc.,  very  few  books 
existed  that  had  more  than  slight  value.  Their  treat- 
ment of  the  subject  was  too  general.  Much  of  the 
literature  is  scarcely  in  print,  before  it  is  out  of  date 
because  of  the  extraordinary  mobility  and  change  of 
our  commercial  order.  The  reaction  of  this  swiftly 
changing  mechanism  upon  our  entire  life  gives  us  a 
series  of  problems  but  partially  expressed  in  books 
and  differing  in  important  ways  from  anything  that 
Europe  offers. 

For  instance,  we  are  always  perplexed  by  the  ques- 
tion, why  distributive  cooperation  should  be  so  suc- 
cessful in  England  but  so  dreary  a  failure  here. 
There  are  many  reasons,  but  the  main  one  is  found 
in  the  conditions  that  have  been  brought  about  by 


2  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

our  material  prosperity,  accompanied  by  carelessly 
extravagant  habits,  together  with  our  system  of  rapid 
transportation.  We  have  not  yet  been  forced  to  the 
pettier  economies.  Our  working  classes  are  con- 
temptuous of  saving  one  cent  or  two  cents.  The 
excursion  train  from  a  distance  and  the  marvellous 
development  of  the  city  and  suburban  trolley  take  the 
crowd  to  the  great  stores  where  the  customer  is  served 
better,  more  cheaply,  and  more  quickly  than  any  co- 
operative store  has  any  present  hope  of  doing.  The 
great  store  touches  the  imagination,  especially  of  the 
poorer  people.  I  was  for  several  years  member  of  a 
cooperative  store.  It  failed,  partly  because  the  wives 
of  labor  men  among  whom  it  originated  would  not 
continue  to  patronize  it.  One  of  them  told  me:  "Oh, 
but  it's  no  fun  to  go  to  that  stuffy  place.  When  I  go 
to  R.  H.  White's,  it's  like  going  to  a  theatre,  and  my 
fare  in  and  out  of  the  city  costs  me  nothing,  for  I  can 
get  things  cheaper  there."  Here  are  cheapness,  a 
satisfied  imagination,  and  an  exhilarating  ride  all  for 
the  same  money.  American  invention  has  made  it 
possible,  and  not  until  an  entirely  new  set  of  condi- 
tions has  been  thrust  upon  us  is  there  a  breath  of 
hope  for  the  English  cooperation. 

In  la  grande  Industrie  the  same  forces  are  produc- 
ing a  form  of  cooperation  that  is  beyond  anything  that 
Europe  has  reached.  The  democratization  of  indus- 
try is  slowly  coming  from  the  top  into  a  forced 
cooperation  with  organized  labor.  The  "joint  agree- 
ment" between  employer  and  employed  has  begun. 
It  compels  a  kind  of  partnership  between  capital  and 
labor.  Every  step  in  its  development  will  destroy 
the  old  individualistic  and  arbitrary  doctrine  of  the 


PERSONAL  AND   INTRODUCTORY  3 

employer  that  is  expressed  in  such  terms  as  "  This  is 
my  business,"  "  I  will  not  arbitrate,"  "  I  will  deal  only 
with  individuals,"  etc.  Every  extension  of  the  joint 
agreement  will  bring  the  great  business  into  closer 
unity  with  the  best  ideals  of  our  political  life.  Yet 
no  book  begins  to  describe  the  mechanism  that  makes 
these  great  changes  possible.  Only  in  trade  and 
technical  journals  does  one  find  even  a  partial  account 
of  them. 

Again,  of  our  trade  unions,  there  is  almost  no  litera- 
ture. The  close  and  exhaustive  study  of  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Webb  is  admirable  for  the  English  trade-union 
tradition.  It  but  partially  describes  the  organization 
of  labor  in  the  United  States.  The  mobility  that  ap- 
plied invention  has  brought  about  has  given  us  a 
unionism  distinct  in  important  particulars  from  that 
which  any  foreign  country  can  show. 

The  effect  of  foreign  leadership  (especially  of  the 
Irish)  in  our  unions  is  one  real  difference,  but  the 
mobility  and  the  chances  this  offers  to  leave  one's 
position  for  a  better,  modifies  our  trade  union  in 
many  ways.  No  sooner  is  the  labor  leader  trained  for 
his  duties  than  he  is  likely  to  leave  his  union  and  "  go 
into  business."  I  can  count  from  memory  thirteen 
men  in  Massachusetts,  who  were  in  their  time  and  place 
leaders,  who  now  occupy  positions  in  politics  or  in  busi- 
ness. A  friend  who  always  defends  the  trade  union 
tells  me  that  in  Chicago  he  knows  of  more  than  thirty 
men,  formerly  at  the  front  in  their  respective  unions, 
who  now  hold  political  office  in  that  city.  "  They  are 
always  on  the  watch,"  he  adds,  "  for  better  positions 
in  other  occupations,  after  they  have  struggled  some 
years  with  the  external,  and  more  especially  with  the 


4  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

internal,  difficulties  of  the  unions."  I  asked  one  of  the 
prominent  leaders  how  he  stood  the  strain  which  I 
knew  was  brought  to  bear  upon  him.  "  I  can't  stand 
it  long,"  he  said ;  "  I  shall  keep  my  eye  out  for  a  busi- 
ness position,  and  when  I  can  leave  my  present  place 
honorably,  I  shall  do  it." 

In  Pittsburg,  during  the  steel  strike,  I  tried  to  find 
some  of  the  ex-presidents  of  that  strong  trade  union. 
The  most  important  of  the  former  officials  had  gone 
into  other  occupations.  That  more  solidified  group 
consciousness  that  constitutes  a  class  feeling  of  which 
radical  socialism  makes  so  much,  is  thus  difficult  to 
maintain  in  this  country.  Such  dangers  as  there  are 
in  this  fighting  class-spirit  in  the  unions  is  kept  more 
keenly  alive  by  those  employers  who  think  it  the 
part  of  wisdom  to  defeat  the  real  ends  of  organized 
labor. 

During  six  years  of  weekly  economic  lectures  before 
a  trade-union  audience,  I  learned  that  any  trade-union 
literature  accessible  was  upon  the  whole  misleading. 
An  academic  student,  who  has  read  never  so  faithfully 
all  the  books,  has  to  learn  his  entire  lesson  over  again 
by  contact  with  the  actual  concrete  struggles  of 
unions  among  themselves  and  with  their  employers. 
I  had  been  taught  to  believe,  for  example,  that  the 
limitation  of  the  number  of  apprentices  by  the  unions 
was  an  inexcusable  tyranny  over  American  liberty. 
In  spite  of  the  abuses  of  this  limitation,  one  finds  that 
it  is  an  integral  part  of  a  common  effort  characteriz- 
ing our  entire  business  system.  It  is  in  its  nature  in 
no  way  peculiar  to  the  trade  union.  I  once  saw  the 
establishment  of  a  new  union  in  a  Massachusetts  shoe 
town.  At  first  there  was  no  thought  of  opposing  any 


PERSONAL  AND   INTRODUCTORY  5 

number  of  young  men  who  cared  to  come  in,  but  in  a 
slackened  period  of  work,  it  was  found  that  eight  and 
nine  per  cent  of  their  own  trade-union  members  were 
without  work.  At  that  time  the  rule  was  made  limit- 
ing the  number  of  those  learning  the  trade.  "  Why," 
I  was  asked,  "  should  we  let  a  lot  of  young  fellows 
come  in  to  compete  against  our  old  members  who 
can't  get  work  ?  "  There  is  often  a  steady  average 
of  two,  three,  and  four  per  cent  of  older  members 
thus  out  of  work  in  half  our  unions.  This  explana- 
tion does  not  meet  all  the  difficulties  in  the  limitation 
of  those  permitted  to  learn  the  trade  at  a  given  time. 
It  does  enable  us  to  see  the  reasons  why  the  attempt 
is  made  and  to  see  further  that  it  is  as  natural  as  any 
of  those  checks  to  lessen  competition  which  fill  our 
commercial  life.  I  have  heard  this  reply  from  an  in- 
dignant agent  of  the  union :  "  They  ask  us  to  put  in 
more  apprentices  when  there  is  no  shortage  of  work- 
men; when  we  can  furnish  first-rate  men  who  are 
now  out  of  work.  That  would  mean  that  we  were  to 
help  train  new  men  to  compete  with  our  own  members 
out  of  work."  This  action  of  the  union  to  meet  the 
competing  forces  that  endanger  its  common  life  is  at 
least  as  intelligent  as  the  tariff,  or  the  limitation  of 
output  by  a  great  corporation.  This  check  upon 
competition  in  the  trade  union  is  a  superior  morality 
as  compared  with  that  large  part  of  business  which 
uses  the  tariff  to  sell  our  products  to  foreign  com- 
petitors twenty  per  cent  cheaper  than  to  our  own 
people. 

This  limitation  of  apprentices  is,  however,  a  very 
elementary  difficulty.  The  attitude  of  the  trade 
union  toward  the  new  inventions  presents  a  problem 


6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

as  delicate  as  it  is  fundamental  in  character.  In 
the  chapter  on  machinery  it  is  considered  at  length. 
It  is  mentioned  here  solely  for  the  purpose  of  show- 
ing how  helpless  a  student  is  who  trusts  to  the  cur- 
rent economic  books  for  light.  The  hackneyed 
charge  that  trade  unions  "  oppose  new  machinery " 
carries  an  unhappy  fact  in  it,  but  unless  carefully 
explained,  it  holds  far  more  error  than  truth.  If 
exception  be  made  of  the  more  ignorant  members, 
the  better  unions  in  the  United  States  do  not  fight 
the  machine  as  such.  Their  opposition  is  against  the 
way  in  which  the  machine  may  be  made  to  readjust 
the  wage  scale  within  the  labor  group  whose  interests 
are  immediately  affected.  In  the  conflict  between 
employer  and  employed,  the  "  storm  centre  "  is  largely 
at  this  point  where  science  and  invention  are  applied 
to  industry. 

The  hard  lesson  which  the  employer  has  to  learn 
is  that  he  cannot  alone  and  arbitrarily  decide  this 
question  of  machinery.  The  instinct  of  the  trade 
union  to  have  some  "say"  about  this  is  a  perfectly 
sound  instinct.  Yet  the  union  has  also  to  learn  its 
lesson,  that  the  new  inventions  must  be  put  to  their 
tasks  without  any  of  the  stupid  hindrances  which 
discredit  many  of  the  English  unions  and  which  are 
far  too  prevalent  in  certain  American  unions. 

It  seems  again  on  its  face  very  senseless  for  a  union 
to  oppose  piece-work.  But  when  one  sees  that  piece- 
work may  be  used  like  a  new  invention,  to  change 
the  wage  scale,  keep  down  wages,  and  increase  the 
stint  of  work,  the  reason  for  this  opposition  appears. 
There  are  shops  in  which  piece-work  results  in  chang- 
ing the  wage  scale  three  times  in  a  year.  It  so  fre- 


PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY  7 

quently  happens  that  the  readjustment  lowers  the 
wage  that  piece-work  becomes  an  object  of  suspicion. 
I  have  had  the  plainest  admissions  from  employers 
that  the  trade-union  resistance  to  piece-work  was 
wholly  justified  if  the  resistance  could  be  guarded 
from  abuses. 

So  also  the  "  un-American  way  "  of  restricting  the 
ability  of  exceptional  men,  the  "  levelling  down  to 
inferiority,"  and  other  confident  charges  made  against 
the  unions  are  seen  to  have  so  much  justification  in 
actual  experience  as  to  leave  the  student  far  more 
tolerant  even  of  the  abuses  connected  with  them. 

These  illustrations  may  make  clear  why  I  have 
been  led  in  the  following  chapters  to  use  with  so 
much  freedom  purely  personal  opinions  that  have 
been  expressed  to  me  during  twenty  years  of  inves- 
tigation and  lecturing  upon  the  topics  here  con- 
sidered. It  has  not,  in  most  instances,  seemed  to  me 
fair  to  give  names.  The  opinions  were  in  many  in- 
stances given  on  the  express  condition  that  the  name 
be  not  used.  That  this  is  open  to  censure  and  may 
be  thought  to  constitute  a  weakness  in  the  book,  I 
readily  admit.  The  responsibilities  for  the  weakness 
I  must  accept.  I  trust  that  some  corresponding 
advantages  may  appear  in  the  result,  as  I  report 
from  responsible  men  on  the  labor  side,  from  social- 
ists, business  managers,  engineers,  and  capitalists 
alike. 

It  was  another  inexcusably  slow  discovery  that 
most  men  do  not  put  their  deepest  opinions  into  print, 
or  state  them  before  the  public.  My  first  clear  con- 
ception of  this  was  in  listening  during  a  semester  to 
a  German  professor.  From  these  lectures  and  from 


8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

a  stiff  volume  that  he  had  already  published,  I  be- 
lieved myself  in  possession  of  his  most  important 
opinions.  In  later  and  more  personal  conversations 
with  him,  I  found  another  and  very  different  man,  of 
whom  no  printed  utterance  would  have  given  me  a 
glimpse.  He  was  far  more  radical,  far  bolder  in  his 
critical  restrictions  about  the  institutional  life  about 
him,  and  far  more  willing  to  welcome  great  changes 
in  our  social  organization. 

I  do  not  impeach  this  man's  sincerity.  He  was 
giving  to  me  the  freer  and  more  extemporaneous 
opinions  that  are  habitual  in  private  intercourse.  In 
those  moments  he  was  unconcerned  about  the  matu- 
rity or  coordination  of  his  views.  I  yet  believe  there 
was  more  of  the  real  man  in  his  conversations,  more 
even  of  his  real  thought,  than  in  the  elaborated  and 
guarded  utterances  as  publicly  expressed.  In  the 
whole  class  of  socially  disturbing  topics  the  freest 
and  deepest  opinions  are  not  usually  printed  in  a 
book,  and,  so  far  as  this  is  true,  one  has  to  go  else- 
where for  full  evidence.1 

Many  of  the  socialists  who  make  the  best  litera- 
ture for  the  propaganda,  do  not,  any  more  than  the 
professor,  put  all  their  real  opinions  into  their  pub- 
lications. Like  the  respectabilities  among  the  bour- 
geois, they  have  opinions  for  dress  parade  —  opinions 
that  are  safe  and  orthodox  for  the  cause  they  rep- 
resent. They  may  publicly  maintain  with  great 
vehemence  the  essential  integrity  of  Karl  Marx's 

1  Professor  J.  W.  Jenks  tells  me  that  in  his  long  and  exhaustive 
investigation  of  the  "  trust,"  by  far  the  most  important  facts  about  the 
purposes  and  methods  of  these  combinations  were  only  secured  in 
private  conversation. 


PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY  9 

theory  of  socialism.  In  private  they  may  admit  to 
you,  as  the  best-trained  French  and  German  social- 
ists have  admitted  to  me,  that  Marx's  fundamental 
doctrine  of  surplus  value  is  unsound.  Another 
may  have  philosophic  training  enough  to  challenge 
Marx's  fatalistic  theory  of  history.  I  asked  a  culti- 
vated Belgian  socialist  why  he  did  not  openly  pro- 
claim these  doubts  about  the  "  master."  "  We 
can't  yet  afford,"  he  said,  "to  embarrass  our  cause 
by  displaying  doubts  about  the  theories  on  which 
it  is  believed  to  rest."  The  value  of  these  private 
opinions  is  priceless  because  they  point  the  way 
along  which  the  less  enlightened  mass  of  socialist 
thought  will  follow.  A  collectivist  editor  in  Paris 
gave  this  reason  why  he  should  not  expose  these 
doubts  about  the  sacred  traditions :  "  You  must  have," 
he  said,  "  a  certain  unity  and  completeness  of  form  in 
your  exposition,  or  it  loses  literary  effectiveness.  I 
must  have  this,  or  I  could  get  no  scholars  to  read 
what  I  write."  It  is  precisely  this  vanity  for  what 
will  excite  academic  or  conventional  approval  that 
devitalizes  so  many  books.  To  appear  "  scientific," 
"  to  display  unity  of  treatment,"  to  have  showy  classi- 
fications in  which  new  technical  names  are  given  to 
very  well-known  and  commonplace  facts,  is  the  subt- 
lest form  which  temptation  puts  on  for  these  ambi- 
tions. This  is  not  harmful  among  subjects  where  a 
"  synthesis  "  is  possible,  where  "  form  and  complete- 
ness "  are  in  any  way  attainable  ;  but  in  those  studies 
that  have  to  do  with  the  vastness  and  complexity  of 
human  society  and  its  reorganization,  the  craving  for 
these  literary  and  scientific  graces  has  left  a  great  deal 
of  our  printed  sociology  chillingly  empty  of  result. 


IO  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

For  this  very  reason  our  need  is  the  greater  for 
genuine  opinions  and  simple  facts,  even  if  the  time  is 
not  yet  come  for  their  more  systematized  exposition. 

Not  only  socialists  but  many  of  our  most  influen- 
tial trade-union  leaders  have  grown  into  larger 
opinions  than  they  can  yet  enforce  upon  their  fol- 
lowers. They  are  as  a  unit  upon  the  importance  of 
keeping  every  contract  their  unions  sign  with  em- 
ployers. They  are  as  a  unit  against  all  violence 
against  non-union  men.  They  are  often  helpless 
before  the  impulsive  action  of  some  local  union,  but 
their  unquestioned  policy  is  to  strengthen  their 
organization  at  these  weaker  points.  There  are  other 
issues  upon  which  they  are  forced  to  be  as  politic  as 
a  "dynamic  clergyman  with  a  static  congregation." 
Too  many  of  the  workmen  are  not  yet  enlightened 
enough  to  take  the  larger  view.  There  are  unions, 
for  example,  in  which  the  amount  of  work  done  is 
deliberately  restricted  as  a  matter  of  principle.  I 
have  talked  at  length  recently  with  the  head  of  such 
an  organization.  He  said  to  me,  "I  know  perfectly 
well  that  the  policy  is  suicidal.  I  know  that  a  smaller 
output  means,  upon  the  whole,  less  comfort  all  round. 
The  men  are  under  the  illusion  that  there  is  only 
about  so  much  work  to  be  done  and  they  want  to 
'stretch  it  out/  or  'not  use  it  up  too  quick.'  I  have 
several  times  got  a  lot  of  men  together  and  explained 
to  them  why  the  policy  is  a  bad  one.  But  if  I  were 
to  be  too  strict  I  should  lose  my  place,  and  a  man 
would  be  put  in  who  wouldn't  try  to  educate  them 
into  better  sense.  In  time  we  can  teach  them  better. 
When  the  employers  lecture  them  about  this  they  all 
think  he  is  simply  trying  to  get  more  work  for  the 


PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY  II 

same  money.  When  I  lecture  them  they  at  least 
begin  to  talk  it  over  and  think  about  it." 

Another  source  of  penetrating  criticism  comes  from 
a  certain  contemplative  type  of  successful  business 
man  who  can  rarely  be  induced  to  put  his  strictures 
in  print.  I  have,  for  instance,  never  heard  an  abler 
defence  of  Henry  George's  theory  of  the  single  tax 
than  from  a  man  who  had  made  a  fortune  in  city 
land  speculation.  He  did  not  like  to  apply  the 
theory  to  the  country  at  large,  because  he  thought 
that  the  practical  difficulties  would  be  too  great ;  but 
for  municipal  areas  he  came  to  believe  that  we  are 
simply  stupid  not  to  turn  the  enormous  land  values 
created  by  an  increasing  population  into  the  public 
treasury. 

In  gathering  evidence  for  a  report  on  German 
workingmen's  insurance,  I  found  that  the  published 
opinions  of  many  business  men  in  that  country  had 
upon  the  whole  a  very  different  and  certainly  a  far 
lower  value  than  opinions  one  could  get  from  them  in 
conversation.  One  of  our  own  trust  organizers  has 
published  valuable  opinions  on  the  subject  of  the  trust. 
In  private,  I  heard  him  analyze  the  actual  dangers  of 
the  trust  with  a  searching  skill  that  I  have  not  seen 
equalled.  I  asked  him  why  he  put  none  of  these 
views  into  print.  He  replied :  "  Those  are  things  a 
wise  man  doesn't  say  in  public.  I  am  not  advertising 
the  weakness  of  the  trust." 

Now  it  is  the  very  things  "  the  wise  man  does  not 
say  in  public  "  that  I  wish  to  get  in  as  evidence.  I 
would  not  exclude  the  soberer  and  more  cautious  pub- 
lic or  printed  view,  but  the  further  emphasis  which 
I  venture  to  give  to  the  open  and  unreserved  opin- 


12  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

ions  which  men  express  when  free  from  the  shadow 
of  an  audience,  or  when  they  are  not  expected  to 
stand  by  the  temporary  stock  interests  of  their  class, 
may  at  least  supplement  other  forms  of  testimony. 
More  than  this  I  will  not  claim  for  it. 

If  this  evidence  seems  like  a  too  irresponsible  sort 
of  gossip,  I  can  only  answer  that  the  volume  contains 
no  reference  that  is  not  the  honest  expression  of 
opinion  by  men  whom  the  investigator  would  naturally 
seek  as  most  likely  to  throw  light  on  his  subject. 

It  is  true  that  these  critics  are  exceptions.  The 
prevailing  commercial  opinion  is  that  which  justifies 
the  methods  under  which  one's  wealth  is  gathered.  It 
is  doubtful  if  any  bias  exists  at  the  present  day  that 
acts  with  more  blinding  power  upon  men  than  the 
bias  associated  with  their  money  income.  There  is 
scarcely  any  rich  source  of  pecuniary  profit  for  which 
the  average  citizen  will  not  find  ethical  justification. 
During  my  first  visit  to  the  anthracite  coal  fields,  I 
found  a  coal  operator  who  was  making  large  profits 
from  a  private  bar  to  which  his  miners  were  expected 
to  come  for  their  drink,  as  they  were  expected  to 
patronize  his  company  store.  He  had  no  difficulty  in 
defending  this  retailing  of  liquor  on  what  he  insisted 
were  moral  grounds.  The  miners  could  be  more 
easily  guarded  against  excesses.  They  would  spend 
less  money  than  in  the  low  groggeries  of  the  town. 
Certain  miners'  wives  had  expressed  their  gratitude 
to  him  for  these  benefits.  There  was  perhaps  no 
conscious  humbuggery  in  this,  but  the  profits  on  his 
gin  and  whiskey  were  so  alluring  as  to  bias  his  judg- 
ment. The  proof  of  this  came  in  abundance  from 
his  fellow-employers  who  did  not  or  would  not  keep 


PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY  13 

a  bar.  Free  from  the  bias,  they  were  unqualified 
in  their  condemnation  of  this  source  of  income  for 
one  in  this  employer's  position.  In  the  same  way 
practically  every  business  abuse  against  the  miners  is 
condemned  by  those  employers  who  have  got  rid  of 
the  abuse.  The  "  company  store"  began  as  a  neces- 
sity for  the  miners,  but  when  the  town  grew  and  pri- 
vate stores  everywhere  sprang  up,  the  miners  naturally 
preferred  to  buy,  as  the  rest  of  us  do,  where  they 
liked.  The  company  store  from  this  time  on  was  a 
reproach  to  the  best  business  management.  Yet  I 
never  knew  an  operator,  still  maintaining  one,  who 
did  not  argue  with  unction  and  fervor  that  they  were 
very  beneficial  to  the  miner  and  his  family. 

If  one  to-day  go  through  those  regions,  asking  right 
and  left  among  those  who  have  discontinued  the 
company  stores,  he  will  hear  the  frankest  admission 
that  it  had  long  since  come  to  be  a  nuisance  and  with- 
out any  justification.  In  1900,  when  operators  were 
indignantly  defending  their  method  of  selling  powder 
to  their  miners  greatly  above  the  market  price,  I 
found  that  the  operators  who  did  not  do  this,  had 
only  sarcasm  for  the  ingenious  reasons  which  the 
other  employers  were  giving.  The  president  of  a 
company  told  me  :  "  The  miners  are  perfectly  right 
in  their  contention.  It  is  true  that  the  higher  price 
entered  into  an  older  agreement,  but  this  clumsy 
method  of  paying  wages  is  one  that  any  first-rate 
business  man  ought  to  be  ashamed  of." 

The  miners  in  the  recent  strike  (1902)  asked  among 
other  things,  to  have  the  coal  weighed  as  it  comes 
from  the  mine,  and  to  be  paid  by  weight  rather 
than  by  car-load.  They  honestly  believe  that  they  are 


14  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

cheated  out  of  a  portion  of  their  earnings.  The  em- 
ployers, who  still  pay  by  this  rough  and  elastic  car 
measurement,  would  make  the  inquirer  believe  that 
the  miners'  demand  is  as  ignorant  as  it  is  absurd. 
Fortunately  a  small  proportion  of  the  coal  now  mined 
is  paid  by  weight.  Among  employers  who  have 
adopted  this  method,  I  found  the  strongest  convic- 
tions that  the  miners  were  in  the  main  right  about 
this  issue. 

Again,  when  one  sees  the  conditions  under  which 
the  "  pumpmen  "  work  for  twelve  hours  daily  in  the 
mines,  he  is  curious  to  hear  what  defence  can  be  made 
for  such  slavish  toil.  The  first  employer  I  asked, 
said :  "  The  pumpmen  are  not  overworked.  They 
would  be  perfectly  contented  if  the  trade-union  bullies 
would  let  them  alone."  The  mine  boss  and  the  super- 
intendent know  what  the  pumpman's  life  means. 
When  they  were  convinced  that  their  names  would 
not  be  used,  I  got  from  them  the  most  pronounced 
opinions  that  eight  hours  a  day  is  long  enough  for 
pumpmen  to  work.  The  superintendent  said,  "The 
man  who  denies  the  grievance  of  the  pumpman 
either  does  not  know  or  does  not  care  how  men  are 
used." 

There  is  no  great  business  that  does  not  thus  open 
to  the  investigator,  from  its  own  inner  circles,  the 
most  trustworthy  evidence  concerning  abuses.  From 
evidence  of  this  character,  we  may  get  invaluable  hints 
as  to  general  industrial  tendencies  and  to  possible  im- 
provements. There  is  invariably  a  small  minority  of 
men  who  in  speculative  discussion  will  freely  take  the 
larger  social  point  of  view,  even  if  against  their 
interests.  A  far  larger  class  must  first  have  thrown  off 


PERSONAL  AND  INTRODUCTORY  15 

the  abuse  before  unbiassed  judgment  becomes  easy. 
In  most  business  communities  may  be  found  a  type 
of  business  man  who  has  retired  long  enough  from 
active  work  to  look  with  a  certain  largeness  upon 
these  labor  questions.  They  are  among  the  best  of 
witnesses.  A  retired  shoe  manufacturer  in  Massa- 
chusetts, who  now  ranks  among  the  rich  men  in  his 
community,  has  told  me  that  the  whole  problem  had 
entirely  changed  to  him  as  he  looked  back  upon  the 
thirty  years  of  chronic  struggle  with  the  trade  union. 
"  They  make  a  good  many  stupid  mistakes,"  he  said, 
"  but  an  organization  strong  enough  to  fight  the  em- 
ployer is  a  necessity  to  labor.  Competition  so  forces 
many  of  the  best  employers  to  copy  the  sharp  tricks 
of  the  worst  employers  in  lowering  wages,  that  the 
trade  union  must  be  equipped  to  fight  against  these 
reductions,-  or  for  a  rise  in  wages  when  business  is 
more  prosperous.  I  have  fought  the  union  in  more 
than  twenty  strikes,  but  I  can  now  see  that  they  were 
at  least  as  right  and  as  reasonable  as  I  was."  It  is 
this  kind  of  evidence  of  which  I  make  very  free  use 
in  this  volume.  It  has  the  competence  wrought  out 
of  long  experience.  It  is  dispassionate  and  disin- 
terested. This  man  had  been  separated  from  the  tug 
and  warfare  of  practical  affairs  long  enough  to  see 
them  in  their  larger  social  relations.  Any  one  who 
had  gone  to  him  in  earlier  days,  when  he  was  in  the 
heat  and  turmoil  of  his  occupation,  would  have  got 
simply  a  snap-shot  judgment  based  upon  the  sup- 
posed business  interests  of  that  moment.  It  would 
have  its  value  even  then,  but  not  the  value  of  the 
later  and  calmer  mood. 

There  is  in  this  volume  very  frequent  reference  to 


1 6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

problems  arising  in  the  coal  industry.  This  is  done 
partly  because  of  many  visits  to  the  soft-  and  hard- 
coal  regions.  It  is  further  due  to  the  fact  that  no 
business  presents  a  better  point  of  view  for  study, 
either  of  practice  or  of  theory,  in  the  labor  question. 
I  have  excluded  the  soft-coal  interest  from  the  pres- 
ent discussion  because  the  very  immensity  of  area 
covered  leaves  it  still  open  to  general  competitive 
influence.  With  the  exception  of  the  remarkable 
common  organization  at  this  moment  existing  between 
the  federated  trade  union  and  the  employers,  it  throws 
far  less  light  on  the  subjects  herein  treated.  The 
hard  or  anthracite  coal  is  lodged  by  nature  in  so  com- 
pact a  pocket;  it  has  so  much  the  character  of  a 
monopoly,  in  spite  of  soft-coal  rivalry,  that  it  stands 
out  in  admirable  relief  for  investigation.  During  the 
last  eighteen  years  I  have  visited  every  important 
strike  in  these  regions.  Nowhere  can  one  see  quite 
so  clearly  the  relation  between  business  proper  and 
the  various  harassing  problems  that  are  more  and 
more  to  challenge  our  corporate  good  sense.  This 
business  is  on  the  competitive  outskirts  where  the 
merits  or  demerits  of  further  state  interference  and 
regulative  legislation  are  likely  to  be  forced  upon  us 
at  no  distant  day.  The  last  strike  marks  an  epoch 
in  the  development  of  socialistic  thought  in  this 
country. 


CHAPTER   I 

SOME    GENERALITIES 

THOUGH  the  tides  of  business  prosperity  are  just 
now  at  their  height,  a  plague  of  embittered  strikes 
has  fallen  upon  our  industries.  Especially  have  they 
fallen  upon  interests  that  are  partly  of  public  charac- 
ter or  (what  is  fast  becoming  the  same  thing)  upon 
those  that  have  grown  great  by  combination.  Over- 
topping all  others  has  been  the  prolonged  and  mo- 
mentous strife  in  Pennsylvania.  In  the  anthracite 
coal  regions  the  miners  won  in  the  struggle  of  1900, 
but  the  victory  brought  little  contentment.  It  was 
followed  by  more  than  a  hundred  local  strikes,  only 
to  break  out  at  last  into  a  strife  that  has  stirred  public 
opinion  as  no  other  event  in  our  labor  history. 

From  the  time  when  the  government  first  began  in 
1 88 1  to  make  record  of  labor  controversies,  the  list 
swells  to  more  than  3000  strikes  in  the  coal  industry. 
Between  1881  and  1900  there  were  2515. 

This  has  led  to  the  common  assertion  that  labor 
disturbances  are  in  some  way  peculiar  to  coal  mining. 
Very  special  features  attach  to  the  extraction  of  coal, 
but  the  unrest  as  marked  by  strikes  is  precisely  what 
one  finds,  for  example,  in  the  metal,  clothing,  and 
building  trades ;  strikes  in  the  building  trade  are  in- 
deed highest  in  the  list.  It  is  yet  true  that  no  industry 
offers  the  student  of  social  unrest  a  fitter  field  for  study 
c  17 


1 8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

than  that  small  patch  of  country  in  Eastern  Pennsyl- 
vania lying  between  the  Delaware  and  Susquehanna 
rivers.  Nowhere  can  one  get  nearer  to  the  heart  of 
the  conflict.  Every  question  that  socialism  will  more 
and  more  force  upon  the  political  stage  can  here  be 
read  as  upon  an  open  page.  Nowhere  has  competi- 
tion among  private  owners  worked  more  relentlessly 
to  its  own  final  undoing.  Not  even  from  socialist 
critics  does  one  anywhere  hear  more  fault-finding 
with  unrestricted  competition  than  from  the  lips  of 
employing  operators.  Here  are  priceless  "royalties" 
for  absentee  owners.  Here  in  recent  years  may  be 
seen  that  high  capitalization  which  gives  the  hard- 
pressed  operator  his  excuse  for  paying  low  wages. 
Here  competition  among  the  laborers  is  so  unremit- 
ting that  the  147,000  workers  are  occupied  hardly 
190  days  in  the  year.  Including  Sundays,  this  means 
some  175  days  of  enforced  average  idleness.  For  the 
masses  of  breaker  boys,  as  well  as  for  the  less  sturdy 
among  the  adult  miners  and  their  helpers,  this  habit- 
ual irregularity  of  employment  breeds  the  habits  that 
make  the  excesses  of  the  strike  inevitable. 

Among  the  employers  the  old  chaos  of  competition 
has  been  overcome  by  organization,  but  a  forced  chaos 
remains  among  the  miners.  An  absurd  surplus  of 
some  thirty  thousand  men  hangs  about  the  mines, 
and  every  attempt  that  they  have  made  to  secure  the 
real  advantages  of  organization  among  themselves 
has  been  fought  with  obstinate  ill  will  by  the  masters. 
When  individual  and  local  unions  were  established, 
the  natural  and  necessary  impulse  was  to  federate 
them  into  an  organization  strictly  comparable  to  that 
which  capital  had  won  at  the  top.  The  masters  left 


SOME   GENERALITIES  1 9 

no  device  unused  to  defeat  this  new  step.  At  first 
their  formula  ran  thus,  "  I  will  deal  with  my  men  one 
by  one ;  I  will  not  deal  with  them  as  a  union."  Later 
one  heard,  "  I  will  deal  with  the  union  in  my  own 
business;  I  will  not  recognize  any  one  who  comes 
from  another  union." 

In  1900,  when  the  unions  of  the  hard-coal  region 
were  so  strongly  organized  that  the  fact  could  not  be 
ignored,  I  heard  a  few  employers  grudgingly  admit 
that  they  should  be  compelled  to  do  business  with 
this  group  of  unions,  but  never  would  they  at  any 
cost  recognize  the  representative  of  the  soft-coal 
miners.  In  1901  I  heard  the  details  of  a  plan  by 
capitalists  to  bring  both  the  soft  coal  and  the  anthra- 
cite together  into  one  common  organization.  I  asked 
how  it  was  possible  to  control  the  thousand  loosely 
scattered  bituminous  mines.  He  answered :  "  Simply 
because  we  have  got  the  railroads.  Through  rail- 
road control  we  have  got  the  anthracite  where 
no  independent  operator  can  trouble  us  a  bit.  To 
control  the  soft  coal  is  of  course  far  more  difficult, 
but  it  is  not  difficult  if  we  have,  as  we  shall  have, 
proper  control  of  transportation."  I  have  seen 
few  more  uncompromising  enemies  of  trade  unions 
than  this  gentleman.  Yet  he  had  come  to  see  that 
some  sort  of  general  organization  among  the  miners 
must  be  tolerated  among  the  hard-coal  workers.  I 
submitted  the  question,  "  If  you  are,  as  you  say,  to 
extend  the  principle  of  organization  over  both  bitu- 
minous and  anthracite,  why  should  you  object  to  the 
common  union  of  labor  in  both  regions  ?  "  His  reply 
was  that  business  could  not  be  carried  on  under  such 
a  tyranny  as  this  would  imply.  Unified  control  was 


20  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

necessary  for  capital,  otherwise,  he  said,  "  we  shall 
always  be  fighting  our  competitors  in  the  soft-coal 
business  just  as  we  used  to  fight  each  other  in  the 
hard  coal." 

Like  many  another  employer  who  urges  the  neces- 
sity of  capitalistic  organization,  he  denies  this  corre- 
sponding right  to  his  miners.  You  ask  if  the  reasons 
for  combination  are  less  strong  upon  one  side  than 
upon  the  other,  if  competition  works  less  incessantly 
among  laborers  than  among  employers ;  the  answer 
is,  "  No,  but  the  miners  have  come  to  be  so  bad  a  lot 
that  organization  is  unsafe  in  their  hands ;  the  trade 
union  destroys  all  discipline  in  the  mines."  It  is 
true  that  the  presence  of  sixteen  nationalities,  many 
of  them  with  the  lowest  standard  of  living,  is  an 
extremely  annoying  fact,  but  the  employing  class  has 
its  definite  responsibilities  for  the  present  quality  of 
miners.  Such  as  they  are,  they  have  been  expressly 
encouraged  to  come,  in  order  to  keep  wages  low. 

Many  of  these  facts  are  common  to  other  indus- 
tries. For  the  social  investigator  they  get,  however, 
an  added  significance  from  the  monopolistic  char- 
acter of  this  business  made  possible  by  the  cen- 
tralized control  of  tide-water  facilities  and  railway 
transportation.  Ownership  and  control  of  this  busi- 
ness has  been  transformed.  The  determining  factor  is 
now  the  railroad  —  a  semi-public  corporation.  When 
the  employer  now  says,  "  I  will  not  arbitrate ;  I  shall 
run  this  coal  business  as  I  like,  because  it  is  my  prop- 
erty," even  the  miner  has  come  to  see  that  this  atti- 
tude is  incongruous  and  out  of  date. 

During  the  strike  of  1902,  hundreds  of  papers  of 
both  political  parties  met  this  refusal  of  arbitration 


SOME  GENERALITIES  21 

with  every  degree  of  picturesque  denunciation. 
Those  of  the  future  will  look  upon  this  strike  as  a 
landmark  in  the  rapid  crystallization  of  socialistic 
opinion  in  this  country.  But  the  effect  upon  the 
miner  and  his  fellows  has  been  just  as  marked.  He 
is  receiving  more  socialistic  instruction  from  his  em- 
ployer than  from  all  the  agitators  combined. 

It  is  this  new  consciousness  of  difference  between 
a  really  private  business,  like  a  corner  grocery  store, 
and  one  that  has  ceased  to  be  private  in  that  sense, 
which  so  heightens  the  value  of  this  type  of  industry 
as  a  social  study.  If  the  socialistic  spirit  is  to  be 
held  in  abeyance  in  this  country,  businesses  of  this 
character  must  be  handled  with  extraordinary  cau- 
tion. The  attitude  expressed  by,  "  I  refuse  to  arbi- 
trate because  this  is  alone  my  business,"  is  foolhardy 
in  proportion  as  the  business  is  obviously  semi-public, 
as  the  hard-coal  business  with  its  dependence  on  the 
railroad  now  is. 

The  essence  of  arbitration  in  a  business  of  this 
character  and  magnitude  is  an  acknowledgment  that 
the  public  is  concerned  in  the  dispute.  With  the 
multitude  of  smaller  industries  freely  open  to  com- 
petition, we  are  not  shocked  that  they  should  be 
treated  as  strictly  private,  but  in  the  exact  measure 
that  their  service  to  the  public  rests  upon  special 
privileges  granted  by  public  authorities,  shall  we 
rightly  demand  from  them  responsibilities  that  are 
not  merely  private.  If  those  who  have  this  busi- 
ness in  charge  are  not  strong  and  adroit  enough  to 
hold  these  chronic  disorders  in  check,  the  call  for 
some  form  of  state  control  will  steadily  increase 
among  us.  The  public  has  learned  that  to  run  the 


22  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

railroads,  together  with  the  chief  portion  of  the  min- 
ing area,  is  to  get  a  monopolistic  advantage  under 
which  the  consumer  may  be  made  to  pay  in  higher 
prices  every  penny  that  the  strikes  cost. 

In  Lattimer,  when  an  awkward  squad  of  Hazelton 
citizens,  hastily  extemporized  into  constables,  had 
shot  a  score  of  miners,  I  asked  an  operator  about 
the  probable  cost  of  the  strike.  "  But  you  don't 
suppose,"  he  answered,  "that  we  coal  men  are  to 
pay  the  bill?  Anthracite  coal  is  a  luxury,  more 
and  more  in  demand.  The  people  must  have  it. 
We  mine  forty  million  tons  a  year,  and  an  addition 
of  even  fifty  cents  a  ton  means  money  enough  to 
pay  big  bills ;  but  if  we  added  a  dollar  a  ton,  the 
coal  would  be  used." 

The  difficulties  of  socialistic  administration  are  seen 
to  be  so  great,  that  the  business  sense  of  the  American 
people  will  be  careless  of  monopoly  privilege  in  private 
hands  so  long  as  it  is  free  from  conspicuous  abuses. 
As  this  coal  business  is  now  managed,  abuses  are  in- 
evitable. The  railroads  have  a  double  business.  They 
mine  coal,  as  well  as  transport  it.  A  given  road,  at 
one  moment,  may  be  apparently  losing  money  as  a 
miner,  but  making  rich  profits  as  a  carrier  of  coal. 
I  have  known  a  man  with  special  training  for  this 
work  to  exhaust  all  his  resources  in  efforts  to  dis- 
cover how  accounts  in  this  double  business  are  kept. 
His  conclusion  was  that  this  shifting  relation  not  only 
could  be,  but  had  been,  used  to  keep  wages  down. 
Even  if  untrue,  it  has  become  a  source  of  angry  sus- 
picion which  is  felt,  not  only  by  the  independent  in- 
vestigator, but  has  at  last  reached  the  miner  himself. 

At  the  strike  in  the  summer  of  1902,  among  the 


SOME  GENERALITIES  23 

grievances  which  the  miners  enumerated,  I  heard  for 
the  first  time  this  common  complaint :  "  The  operators 
told  us  in  1900  that  the  business  couldn't  possibly 
afford  the  ten  per  cent  advance,  but  they  gave  it  to 
us  when  they  had  to,  and  still  made  good  money. 
Prices  have  gone  up  so  much  since  then,  that  this 
ten  per  cent  advance  has  been  swallowed  up.  We 
ask  for  more,  and  are  told  that  profits  are  so  low  that 
no  higher  wages  can  be  paid,  but  we  can  see  that  the 
railroad  side  of  it  is  making  plenty  of  money,  and  it 
looks  as  if  they  were  taking  it  out  of  us." 

For  the  first  time  I  heard  among  the  miners  the 
talk  of  "overcapitalization."  "They  put  so  much 
money  and  water  in  here,  and  then  have  to  pay 
dividends  off  the  whole  of  it.  That  makes  an 
excuse  for  squeezing  us.  President  Baer  says  he 
must  look  out  for  the  interests  of  his  stockholders, 
and  so  can't  give  us  an  advance.  If  they  hadn't 
put  so  much  water  in  it,  they  could  have  treated  us 
decently."  The  miner  is  merely  saying  what  half 
our  papers  print,  and  what  many  competent  business 
men  believe. 

Here  is  the  exact  ground  why,  for  business  of  this 
character,  the  intelligent  demand  for  "  publicity  "  and 
uniform  and  intelligible  methods  of  bookkeeping,  is 
more  and  more  insisted  upon  by  the  public,  by  stu- 
dents, and  even  by  some  of  our  foremost  business 
men.  The  highest  business  administration  cannot 
afford  to  be  carried  on  in  an  atmosphere  of  justi- 
fied suspicion  that  angers  the  public  and  the  laborers 
alike.  This  atmosphere  of  justified  suspicion  is  the 
direct  source  of  the  most  threatening  unrest  now  in 
our  community.  It  is  certain  that  a  great  deal  of  it 


24  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

can  be  removed  by  an  open  and  fearless  recognition 
that  these  half-public  corporations  have  become  so  far 
"  socialized,"  that  the  old  rights  of  secrecy  have  lost 
their  warrant. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  the  first  real  difficulty  ap- 
pears. There  is  no  way  to  make  this  principle  of 
"  publicity  "  effective  without  an  extension  of  legal 
regulation. 

The  reasons  for  this  extended  activity  of  govern- 
ment are  not  fewer  in  the  United  States  than  among 
any  other  people,  but  the  practical  difficulties  are  far 
greater  here,  because  of  the  divided  authority  be- 
tween the  central  government  and  the  states.  But 
the  practical  embarrassments  in  which  this  divided 
authority  leaves  us,  constitute  a  very  breeding  ground 
for  the  growth  of  socialistic  sympathy.  The  ordeal 
which  we  cannot  escape  is,  that,  in  spite  of  these 
added  perplexities,  the  battle  has  to  be  fought  out  on 
an  area  that  is  essentially  an  area  of  politics. 

Yet  powerful  business  interests  will  fight  the  pro- 
visions that  constitute  this  social  politics  wherever  its 
aim  is  to  raise  the  standard  of  the  workingman's 
life.  They  will  oppose  them  as  they  oppose  the 
really  effective  organization  of  labor ;  as  they  oppose 
the  legislation  that  would  eliminate  the  child  from 
industry,  or  give  to  those  stricken  by  industrial  acci- 
dents a  properly  organized  method  of  compensation. 

In  the  long  struggle  before  us  to  learn  to  use  these 
principles  of  regulation  with  unflinching  fairness  to 
the  weak  as  well  as  to  the  strong,  we  are  beset  by  two 
difficulties,  —  one  that  has  come  to  be  temperamental, 
the  other  economic  and  political. 

No  people  was  ever  born  so  gayly  and  so  confidently 


SOME   GENERALITIES  25 

indifferent  to  history  and  experience  as  the  people  of 
the  United  States.  During  the  Civil  War,  Charles 
Sumner  was  patronizingly  assured  at  a  London  din- 
ner table  that  the  North  could  not  conquer,  "there 
was  no  history  extant  to  warrant  such  a  hope."  With 
a  humor  he  rarely  showed,  Mr.  Sumner  replied,  "Thank 
God,  we  do  not  know  any  history  over  there." 

A  foreign  scholar,  knowing  the  United  States  well, 
himself  equipped  by  large  experience  in  English 
colonial  affairs,  does  his  best  in  Washington  to  put 
his  knowledge  at  the  service  of  those  upon  whom  the 
heavy  burdens  of  our  new  dependencies  had  fallen. 
Our  lack  of  experience  and  consequent  ignorance 
were  complete.  Why  should  not  the  Congressional 
committee  having  these  things  in  charge  delight  to 
listen  ?  England's  long  mastery  of  colonial  policy 
is  known  to  all.  A  man  ready  to  interpret  this  expe- 
rience is  at  hand,  but  he  finds  that  no  soul  in  Wash- 
ington has  the  slightest  curiosity  about  this  almost 
greatest  of  English  achievements.  He  says  to  a 
friendly  member  of  the  Cabinet,  "  But  you  Americans 
do  not  even  want  to  know  the  experience  that  would 
throw  light  on  your  own  present  problems."  One  of 
the  best  and  most  skilled  of  our  politicians  tells  him, 
"  You  are  right ;  those  that  need  the  knowledge  most 
would  not  even  cross  the  street  to  listen  to  your  expo- 
sition, or  if  they  did  they  would  not  take  you  very 
seriously.  We  shall  blunder  through  it  in  our  own 
way." 

There  is  much  to  be  regretted  in  this  unconcern, 
but  perhaps,  for  the  special  problems  involved,  some- 
thing that  we  should  approve.  This  good-natured 
contempt  of  experience  means  sad  waste  in  duplicated 


26  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

experiments ;  it  means  costly  delay  in  administrative 
adjustments,  but  it  also  means  a  carelessness  of  pre- 
cedent, as  precedent,  that  is  often  the  very  condition 
of  brilliant  accomplishment.  An  English  engineer 
said  in  this  country,  "  Because  a  thing  has  been 
done  in  a  certain  way  in  England  is  still  reckoned 
among  the  reasons  why  it  should  continue  to  be  done 
in  something  like  the  same  manner,  but  with  you 
in  the  States  it  is  reversed.  To  tell  an  American 
machinist  how  a  thing  has  been  done,  actually  seems  to 
him  a  reason  for  not  doing  it  in  that  way  any  longer." 
Whatever  of  speedier  advantage  comes  to  us  from 
this  adventurous  spirit  in  the  sphere  of  mechanical 
contrivance,  there  is  consequent  loss  and  embarrass- 
ment for  the  whole  remedial  side  of  the  social  ques- 
tion. This  experience  has  been  dearly  bought,  and 
much  of  it  has  failed,  but  that  which  has  succeeded 
is  very  precious  as  a  model. 

It  is  conceivable  that  impatience  and  unconcern 
about  past  experience  may  be  a  gain  to  the  inventor, 
but  they  cannot  be  a  gain  in  developing  the  kind  of 
legislation  of  which  the  English  Factory  and  Truck 
acts  are  an  example.  Uniform  legal  protection 
against  certain  capitalistic  abuses  on  the  one  side,  and 
against  the  exploitation  of  certain  low-class  labor  on 
the  other,  stands  for  the  next  step  toward  social 
safety.  We  cannot  skip  the  definite  and  successful 
experience  of  other  nations  in  dealing  with  a  class  of 
evils  of  which  industrial  accidents  and  child  labor 
may  be  taken  as  examples. 

The  shrewdest  foreign  observers  who  have  ever 
visited  us,  like  Herbert  Spencer,  have  noted  what 
Lowell  called  the  "  divine  patience  of  my  fellow- 


SOME  GENERALITIES  27 

countrymen  under  abuses."  This  temper  coupled 
with  a  commanding  material  progress  makes  us 
impatient  with  the  fault-finder.  Yet  a  promiscuous 
optimism  about  everything  in  particular  may  be 
just  as  harmful  as  a  uniform  pessimism.  We  have 
to  learn  the  full  meaning  of  specific  sources  of  social 
weakness  in  the  elimination  of  which  legislation  has 
to  play  a  part.  This  leads  from  the  temperamental 
to  the  business  and  political  difficulty. 

It  will  appear  in  the  clearest  light  if  seen  through 
an  illustration  about  which  every  reader  may  easily 
acquire  trustworthy  information. 

In  1902,  I  saw  in  Georgia  and  Alabama  troops  of 
children,  many  under  twelve,  working  the  entire  night. 
I  had  previously  heard  every  detail  of  this  ugly  story, 
in  which  northern  capital  is  implicated  as  much  as 
southern,  yet  nothing  but  personal  observation  would 
have  made  me  believe  the  extent  to  which  this 
blunder  goes  on  in  our  midst.  Whether  one  finds 
this  evil  in  New  Jersey  industries,  among  Illinois 
glass-blowers,  on  the  Chicago  streets  at  night,  or 
in  the  merciless  sweating  of  the  clothing  trade,  it 
is  an  excuseless  wrong  for  which  no  extenuating  word 
can  be  uttered.  It  is  a  source  of  disease,  crime,  and 
social  weakness.  That  it  is  not  a  purposed  cruelty, 
does  not  change  the  fatality  of  the  result.  A  kindly 
employer  in  Alabama  tells  me,  "  Yes,  it  is  bad,  but 
the  parents  of  these  children  will  have  it."  Every 
argument  reproduces  to  the  letter  the  excuses  of 
employers  two  generations  ago,  when  Shaftesbury 
began  his  great  struggle  against  child  labor  in 
England. 

This  stunting  use  of  the  child  in  industry  is  but  a 


28  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

part  of  what  is  perhaps  the  most  threatening  fact  of 
the  new  century,  the  wider  and  more  relentless  use 
of  every  known  agency  to  keep  wages  (and  therefore 
the  standard  of  life)  as  low  as  possible.  This  purpose 
is  not  malicious  or  even  quite  conscious  of  its  end. 
It  results  from  the  enlarged  world  area  on  which  a 
fiercer  competition  now  acts.  The  practical  exigency 
of  this  commercial  struggle  will  appear  to  justify 
every  competitive  use  to  which  lower  and  cheaper 
standards  of  living  can  be  put.  Women,  children, 
negroes,  the  inhabitants  of  our  new  dependencies 
and  every  shade  of  immigrant,  will  one  and  all  be 
used  like  pawns  in  the  great  game  of  immediate 
business  advantage  in  the  markets  of  the  world. 

I  asked  one  of  the  largest  employers  of  labor  in 
the  South  if  he  feared  the  coming  of  the  trade  union. 
"  No,"  he  said,  "  it  is  one  good  result  of  race  preju- 
dice, that  the  negro  will  enable  us  in  the  long  run  to 
weaken  the  trade  union  so  that  it  cannot  harm  us. 
We  can  keep  wages  down  with  the  negro,  and  we 
can  prevent  too  much  organization." 

It  is  in  this  spirit  that  the  lower  standards  are  to 
be  used.  If  this  purpose  should  succeed,  it  has  but 
one  issue,  —  the  immense  strengthening  of  a  pluto- 
cratic administration  at  the  top,  served  by  an  army 
of  high-salaried  helpers,  with  an  £lite  of  skilled  and 
well-paid  workmen,  but  all  resting  on  what  would  be 
essentially  a  serf  class  of  low-paid  labor  and  this 
mass  kept  in  order  by  an  increased  use  of  military 
force. 

If  there  is  any  escape  from  this  peril,  it  is  in  the 
slow  building  up  of  that  system  of  labor  protection 
known  first  as  factory  legislation.  What  is  best  in 


SOME  GENERALITIES  29 

this  legislation  is  not  something  standing  apart  from, 
or  in  antagonism  to,  the  forces  of  public  opinion,  but 
the  deliberate  and  express  record  of  that  opinion 
about  the  hours  and  conditions  under  which  it  would 
have  a  large  part  of  society  work  and  live.  In 
countries  like  England  and  Switzerland,  no  existing 
agencies  have  done  so  much  as  this  form  of  legisla- 
tion to  save  the  labor  standard  from  sinking  to  lower 
levels.  In  our  own  country  the  same  legislation  in 
Massachusetts,  incomplete  as  it  is,  has  worked  with 
admirable  results. 

The  precedent  of  experience  is  in  all  this  the  only 
possible  guide.  Most  of  the  horrors  connected  with 
sweating  in  the  making  of  clothes  could  be  stopped 
if  other  states  had  enforced  a  legislation  as  good  as 
that  of  Massachusetts.  The  law  holds  this  special 
evil  in  check  in  the  city  of  Boston.  The  rivalry 
among  our  states  to  attract  business  or  to  prevent  its 
escape  makes  a  difficulty  which  no  other  nation  feels 
in  giving  shape  to  this  legislation.  A  speaker  before 
a  committee  on  child  labor  in  Alabama  says,  "  We 
get  a  great  advantage  over  the  North,  if  we  work 
twelve  hours  and  have  child  labor."  For  every  im- 
mediate business  interest  this  appeal  is  dangerously 
effective  and  will  long  constitute  a  baffling  perplexity 
in  creating  that  body  of  regulative  measures  which 
is  now  recognized  to  be  as  necessary  for  the  "trust" 
as  for  those  conditions  under  which  multitudes  of 
women  and  children  work. 

It  was  once  believed  that  the  strife  of  multitudi- 
nous private  interests,  if  freely  followed,  would  lead 
to  the  maximum  of  common  gain.  It  was  believed 
that  the  essence  of  economic  wisdom  was  merely  to 


30  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

keep  hands  off.  This  position  of  the  extreme  indi- 
vidualist, as  of  the  philosophic  anarchist,  has  a  rare 
intellectual  fascination.  For  speculative  enchant- 
ment, it  is  easily  supreme  among  social  theories. 
But  the  moment  we  touch  the  world  of  human 
action,  the  moment  we  arrive  where  people  are  hard 
at  work,  it  appears  that  this  policy  of  "  let  alone  "  is 
as  definitely  discarded  as  the  whale-oil  lamp.  Neither 
tory  nor  liberal,  republican  nor  democrat,  pretends 
any  longer  to  "let  things  work  themselves  out." 
Every  government,  democratic  and  monarchical  as 
well,  deliberately  adopts  a  policy  of  elaborate  legal 
regulation.  Nor  is  there  anywhere  a  hint  that  this 
is  to  lessen.  Communities  differ  as  to  the  emphasis 
that  shall  be  placed  on  social  regulations.  New  Zea- 
land goes  to  greater  lengths  than  Denmark;  Switzer- 
land, in  many  things,  further  than  England,  but  all 
alike  accept  it  as  a  practical  working  finality  that 
competitive  forces  cannot  be  trusted  to  work  them- 
selves out  alone.  They  are  brought  under  some  meas- 
ure of  permanent  social  regulation.  Among  men  with 
responsibilities  there  is  now  no  dispute  except  as  to 
the  forms  which  this  regulation  shall  assume  and 
the  degree  to  which  it  shall  be  carried. 

We  need  no  longer  call  in  the  socialist  to  testify 
against  the  uncurbed  struggle  in  industry.  The  last 
twenty  years  have  taught  the  lesson  so  thoroughly  to 
our  foremost  business  men  that  they  are  becoming 
our  instructors.  Not  alone  with  transportation,  but 
with  iron,  with  textiles,  with  insurance,  with  banking, 
and  with  many  of  the  commonest  products,  the  un- 
restrained scramble  of  private  interests  is  now  seen 
to  be  intolerable.  Good  business  now  sets  the  limit 


SOME  GENERALITIES  31 

to  competition  by  organizing  cooperation.  To  check 
and  control  the  excesses  of  competition  has  become 
the  mark  of  first-class  ability.  A  railroad  president 
has  been  dismissed  because  "  he  insists  upon  fighting 
other  roads  instead  of  working  with  them."  Accord- 
ing to  his  own  account,  the  head  of  another  road  owes 
his  appointment  to  the  fact  that  (in  his  own  words) 
"  I  was  known  to  have  some  aptitude  for  working  with 
rival  interests."  Yet  the  term  "  legal  regulation,"  as 
applied  to  industry,  is  still  an  offence  to  the  Ameri- 
can. He  has  not  learned  that  this  regulation  is  but 
a  factor  in  what  we  all  now  agree  is  the  capital  fact 
of  industry  —  organization.  The  term  "industrial 
organization "  carries  no  offence,  but  is  seen  to  be 
the  next  great  step  even  in  further  material  progress. 
On  the  side  of  capital,  organization  began  for  the 
sake  of  safer  dividends.  As  business  enlarged,  and 
came  finally  to  touch  the  wide  and  permanent  wants 
of  the  consumer,  organization  from  the  public  point 
of  view  was  also  found  to  be  necessary.  This  com- 
pleted organization  is  impossible  without  the  as- 
sistance of  legal  regulation  that  is  superior  to  every 
separate  interest. 

What  is  now  forced  upon  every  critical  observer  is 
the  degree  and  extent  of  purely  chaotic  forces  on  the 
industrial  field.  Competition  as  such  has  no  ten- 
dency to  remove  this  mischief,  rather  indeed  to 
aggravate  it  when  business  has  reached  a  given 
stage  of  development.  The  great  lesson  that  em- 
ployers have  to  learn  is  that  organization  has  done 
but  half  its  work  when  their  own  end  alone  is  sys- 
tematized. Organization  has  to  pass  straight  through 
from  top  to  bottom,  including  labor  as  well.  A  part 


32  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

of  this  lesson  for  the  employer  is  that  the  sym- 
pathetic cooperation  of  the  labor  group  is  an  absolute 
necessity  if  industrial  peace  is  to  be  won. 

In  the  recent  strike  (1902)  of  the  hard-coal  mines, 
an  employer  said  to  me,  "  I  have  been  in  this  business 
more  than  twenty-five  years,  and  it  seems  to  me  I 
have  been  in  the  strike  business  rather  than  the  coal 
business."  I  asked  him  if  he  and  his  friends  had  any 
policy  about  the  disorders ;  he  replied,  "  No,  only  to 
smash  'em."  For  many  years  in  these  mining  towns 
I  have  heard  this  answer  from  employers.  As  long 
as  coal  operators  were  fighting  each  other  and  fight- 
ing the  railroads,  there  was  more  excuse  for  this  gue- 
rilla warfare  with  the  unions  ;  but  now  that  combina- 
tion has  come,  "  smashing  'em "  cannot  conceivably 
remain  the  method  of  directors  competent  to  manage 
the  business  as  the  public  will  demand.  It  is  cheer- 
ing to  find  younger  men  now  prominent  in  these 
affairs  who  see  this. 

After  the  miners  had  won  their  strike  of  1900,  some 
of  the  companies  began  to  put  stockades  about  their 
breakers.  I  asked  why,  in  time  of  peace,  this  should  be 
done.  "  Oh,  we  shall  soon  enough  have  another  fight, 
and  we  propose  to  be  ready  for  it.  To  make  a  conces- 
sion to  a  trade  union  means  a  fight  at  the  end."  I  later 
spoke  of  this  with  one  of  the  younger,  but  admittedly 
one  of  the  most  competent,  company  presidents  in 
Pennsylvania.  He  said  :  "  This  whole  policy  with  the 
trade  union  is  out  of  date.  There  must  be  an  end  to 
a  situation  that  breeds  warfare  as  regularly  as  the 
seasons  come.  The  trade  union  is  now  here,  and  we 
shall  not  get  rid  of  it;  I,  for  one,  believe  that  we  ought 
not  to  get  rid  of  it.  It  has  got  to  be  recognized  in 


SOME  GENERALITIES  33 

spite  of  all  that  this  means.  It  will  make  our  work 
for  a  long  time  harder  and  more  disagreeable,  but  the 
truth  is  that  we  employers  have  got  to  learn  the  lesson 
of  working  harmoniously  with  organized  labor."  I 
asked  him  how  this  should  be  done.  "  We  must  do 
it  by  a  slow  process  of  education,  we  must  meet  their 
representatives  in  a  systematic  way,  and  teach  them 
about  our  business  so  far  that  they  will  learn  to  act 
reasonably.  That  is  the  task  before  us."  This  gen- 
tleman acknowledged  that  a  good  deal  of  publicity 
would  be  necessary  in  this  relationship  with  trade- 
union  committees.  "We  cannot  educate  them,"  he 
added,  "  without  letting  them  know  more  about  our 
business  than  they  have  ever  known.  They  must 
study  the  market  conditions,  freight  rates,  and  the 
great  difficulties  like  irregularity  which  bother  us  as 
much  as  it  bothers  them,  and  we  must  help  them  to 
do  this  wisely  and  fairly." 

Returning  to  New  York,  I  took  these  words  to 
a  railroad  president  upon  whose  opinion  every  stu- 
dent sets  high  value.  - "  I  would  not,"  he  said, 
"  change  a  word  in  that  statement.  To  assume 
that  we  have  got  to  go  on  spasmodically  fighting 
the  unions,  is  tactless  and  unintelligent.  The  truth 
is  that  the  kind  of  man  who  is  not  strong  enough 
to  work  with  organized  labor  has  not  the  qualifica- 
tion for  his  position.  It  is  silly  for  powerful  corpora- 
tions to  say,  '  We  will  deal  with  individuals,  not  with 
representatives  of  unions.'  Organization  of  labor 
has  got  to  be  recognized  as  such,  and  dealt  with  as 
such,  and  the  problem  now  is  to  get  men  with  the 
qualities  and  capacities  to  do  this."  On  the  other 
hand,  the  unions  have  to  learn  their  own  lessons. 


34  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

The  public  is  at  present  very  free  with  advice.  "  Let 
them  incorporate  and  give  proper  guarantees  that 
contracts  will  be  kept,  then  employers  will  know 
where  they  stand."  Somewhere  in  the  future,  incor- 
poration may  come,  but,  as  I  shall  try  to  show  later, 
the  employers  and  the  public  have  certain  duties  to 
perform  before  incorporation  is  safe  for  the  union  or 
wise  for  society. 

So  ingrained  has  become  the  suspicion  in  the  trade 
union  that  it  sets  its  face  against  incorporation.  It 
fears  to  trust  its  funds  to  ordinary  court  decisions. 
Judge  Jackson  of  West  Virginia  uses  these  words : 
"  A  professional  set  of  agitators,  organizers,  and  walk- 
ing delegates,  who  roam  all  over  the  country  as 
agents  for  some  combination,  who  are  vampires  that 
live  and  fatten  on  the  honest  labor  of  the  coal  miners 
of  the  country,  and  who  are  busybodies,  creating 
dissatisfaction  among  a  class  of  people  who  are  quiet, 
well  disposed,  and  who  do  not  want  to  be  disturbed 
by  the  unceasing  agitation  of  this  class  of  people." 
The  labor  papers  print  these  words  with  comments 
like  the  following :  "  Can  we  trust  ourselves  and  our 
friends  in  the  hands  of  a  man  who  shows  such  tem- 
per as  this  upon  the  bench  ?  "  They  say  :  "  Incorpo- 
ration in  time  of  trouble  involves  legal  penalties 
which  the  courts  must  enforce.  We  do  not  trust 
their  fairness  on  such  issues."  Good  lawyers  are 
very  indignant  at  this,  but  no  man  who  will  look 
through  the  labor  press  of  the  last  three  or  four 
years  will  doubt  'the  fact,  however  silly  the  opinion 
may  appear  to  him. 

I  have  heard  a  lawyer,  often  called  the  leader  of 
the  bar  in  his  state,  say  that  he  did  not  dare  to  quote 


SOME  GENERALITIES  35 

the  corporation  law  of  Pennsylvania,  because  it  bore 
such  marks  of  gross  partiality  to  capitalistic  inter- 
ests. All  that  organized  labor  in  the  United  States 
does,  is  to  enlarge  the  lawyer's  judgment. 

There  are  few  unpleasanter  facts  than  this  honest 
suspicion  of  organized  labor  that  capitalistic  organiza- 
tion means  to  use  against  it  every  weapon  that  public 
opinion  will  tolerate. 

This  suspicion  appears  inexcusable  to  those  who 
do  not  know  the  history  of  the  union.  In  its  long 
struggle  against  the  hard  practices  of  certain  employ- 
ers, the  trade  union  has  been  taught  its  worst  abuses. 
President  Eliot  justly  puts  down  the  boycott  among 
the  sins  of  the  union,  but  for  a  quarter  of  a  century 
in  Massachusetts  the  employers  used  the  boycott  of 
the  "blacklist"  so  effectively,  that  the  unions  took 
the  hint.  Labor  leaders  of  such  influence  as  Ira 
Steward,  George  E.  McNeil,  and  George  Gunton  were 
trained  in  this  school  of  the  employers'  blacklist.  It 
was  this  same  spirit  that  made  the  necessity  of  the 
walking  delegate.  A  class  of  men  like  the  paid  secre- 
tary had  to  be  created  in  order  to  protect  the  union 
in  those  early  days  when  the  agitation  for  an  ele- 
mentary factory  legislation  began.  Scores  of  labor 
men  prominent  in  the  ten-hour  campaign  were  black- 
listed. It  is  this  long  memory  that  now  plagues  us  in 
these  problems.  Behind  the  "restriction  of  output," 
behind  the  dislike  of  new  machinery  and  piece-work, 
is  the  memory  of  days  when  new  inventions  were  so 
freely  and  rapidly  introduced  that  no  check  upon  the 
speed  was  possible.  The  union  did  not  exist  or  was 
too  weak  to  protest.  The  "  pace  setter  "  flourished, 
and  piece-work,  like  the  machine,  could  be  used  to 


36  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

quicken  the  step.  I  have  heard  older  men  tell  of 
these  days,  when  every  device  was  used  to  set  the 
standard  by  the  fastest  workmen  in  the  room.  Even 
where  the  "  pace  setter  "  has  wholly  disappeared,  the 
recollection  of  this  is  vivid.  Labor  organizations  are 
not  to  be  judged  apart  from  those  early  struggles. 
Side  by  side  with  errors  and  abuses  is  a  story  of  hero- 
ism and  self-sacrifice. 

People  eager  to  know  the  truth  are  perplexed  by 
the  evidence  in  the  great  coal  strike,  but  that  conflict 
cannot  be  understood  apart  from  its  history.  I  asked 
a  pastor  to  give  me  a  list  of  his  older  and  best  family 
men  out  on  strike.  In  a  single  parish,  I  talked  with 
eighteen  of  these  law-abiding  miners.  As  if  one  man 
spoke  for  an  experience  common  to  all,  it  was  the 
memory  of  long  years  of  hardship,  of  greater  and 
pettier  wrongs,  which  nerved  the  striker  in  that  strug- 
gle. These  memories  may  be  very  harmless  in  their 
individual  expression,  but  the  trade  union  guides  them 
into  a  new  channel  where  their  force  becomes  serious 
enough.  A  degree  of  strength  and  independence  of 
labor  organization  has  now  been  reached  in  the  United 
States  which  makes  a  new  danger.  It  cannot  be 
fought  on  the  assumption  that  the  union  is  to  be  de- 
stroyed, without  intensifying  every  bad  quality  in  it. 
The  trade  unionist  knows  that  he  has  helped  to  raise 
wages;  that  more  than  any  other,  he  has  brought 
about  the  best  of  our  labor  legislation.  He  knows 
that  the  main  struggle  now  is  to  raise  the  standard  of 
living  in  his  entire  group.  Every  determined  effort 
to  crush  the  union,  therefore,  appears  to  the  members 
an  attack  on  their  own  aspiration  for  improved  social 
life.  Yet  it  is  the  determination  of  many  of  the 


SOME  GENERALITIES  37 

strongest  business  men  in  this  country  to  cripple 
these  organizations  if  it  can  be  done  without  the  in- 
dignant protests  of  public  opinion. 

It  is  customary  to  speak  fair  words  about  "  the 
right  of  labor  to  organize,"  about  the  usefulness  of 
the  trade  unions  "when  they  keep  to  their  proper 
business,"  etc.  Employers  spoke  very  friendly  words 
of  this  kind  before  the  recent  industrial  commission, 
but  the  labor  organization  which  most  employers 
approve  is  a  docile,  mutual-benefit  association.  It  is 
a  trade  union  that  makes  no  trouble  for  them.  The 
actual  trade  union  which  exists  to  maintain  what  it 
believes  to  be  its  group  rights,  to  make  its  bargains 
collectively  and  struggle  for  every  advantage  it  can 
get,  few  employers  would  tolerate  an  instant  if  they 
could  avoid  it.  A  great  packer  in  Chicago  is  on 
record  as  a  friend  to  unions,  but  in  that  vast  establish- 
ment the  union  was  ruthlessly  crushed.  Mr.  Carnegie 
writes  thus  in  his  "Gospel  of  Wealth,"  p.  114:  — 

"  The  right  of  the  workingmen  to  combine  and  to 
form  trade  unions  is  no  less  sacred  than  the  right  of 
the  manufacturer  to  enter  into  associations  and  confer- 
ences with  his  fellows,  and  it  must  sooner  or  later  be 
conceded.  Indeed,  it  gives  one  but  a  poor  opinion  of 
the  American  workman  if  he  permits  himself  to  be 
deprived  of  a  right  which  his  fellow  in  England  long 
since  conquered  for  himself.  My  experience  has 
been  that  trade  unions,  upon  the  whole,  are  bene- 
ficial both  to  labor  and  to  capital.  They  certainly 
educate  the  workingmen  and  give  them  a  truer  con- 
ception of  the  relations  of  capital  and  labor  than  they 
could  otherwise  form.  The  ablest  and  best  workmen 
eventually  come  to  the  front  in  these  organizations." 


38  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

This  passage  requires  attention.  Mr.  Carnegie  has 
had  long  experience  with  unions.  He  here  finds 
them  "beneficial  both  to  labor  and  capital."  He 
says  they  educate  labor  and  that  the  ablest  and  best 
come  to  the  front  in  them.  This  is  the  polar  opposite 
of  what  so  many  employers  are  now  telling  us.  This 
was  written  in  the  Forum  in  1886,  and  reprinted  in 
1900.  In  spite  of  this  fine  tribute,  the  actual  unions 
in  the  great  shops  where  he  made  his  millions  were 
destroyed.  I  was  told  by  one  of  the  strongest  men 
in  that  company,  "We  would  use  every  resource 
within  our  reach  rather  than  have  a  trace  of  unionism 
in  our  shops." 

Neither  did  Mr.  Schwab  (though  practical  conces- 
sions have  since  been  made)  conceal  his  opinion  about 
the  unions  before  the  industrial  commission.  These 
men  know  they  may  get  an  economic  advantage  over 
England  if  they  are  free  from  the  restraints  of 
unionism.  Every  one  is  now  told  that  the  English 
union  checks  production ;  that  unions  will  not  drive 
at  full  speed.  There  is  much  truth  in  this,  and  the 
inference  we  are  expected  to  draw  is  that,  if  we  had 
no  unions,  a  still  hotter  speed  of  production  could  be 
maintained.  It  is  beyond  question  that  labor  in 
some  sense  interferes  at  this  point. 

The  employer  objects  to  "interference,"  but  a 
strong  labor  union  can  scarcely  exist  without  what 
most  employers  would  call  interference.  To  apply 
the  collective  principle  in  fixing  the  wage  scale,  low- 
ering the  labor  time,  improving  sanitary  or  other 
conditions  for  the  whole  body  of  men  in  any  mill  is 
interference.  When  unions  are  federated,  a  member 
is  necessarily  chosen  to  represent  the  combined  labor 


SOME  GENERALITIES  39 

interests.  This  is  disliked  by  the  employer  more 
cordially  still,  but  it  is  a  condition  essential  to  feder- 
ated labor.  If  there  is  added  to  these  issues  the  most 
burning  of  them  all,  the  manner  in  which  wages  are 
readjusted  by  the  introduction  of  new  inventions,  we 
shall  see  why  employers  set  so  high  a  price  on  free- 
dom from  all  these  annoying  inconveniences  and  de- 
lays. With  the  exception  of  certain  industries,  these 
vexations  are  inherent  in  the  relations  between  feder- 
ated trade  unions  and  the  employer.  The  signs  are 
many  that  our  industrial  managers  will  not  brook  the 
hindrances  incident  to  well-organized  trade  unionism. 
The  new  attitude  throughout  the  South  reflects  the 
less  outspoken  feeling  of  the  North.  One  among 
many  clippings  may  show  the  form  which  this  oppo- 
sition takes.1 

It  is  not .  probable  that  employers  can  destroy 
unionism  in  the  United  States.  Adroit  and  desper- 
ate attempts  will,  however,  be  made,  if  we  mean  by 
unionism  the  undisciplined  and  aggressive  fact  of 
vigorous  and  determined  organizations. 

If  capital  should  prove  too  strong  in  this  struggle, 
the  result  is  easy  to  predict.  The  employers  have 
only  to  convince  organized  labor  that  it  cannot  hold 
its  own  against  the  capitalist  manager,  and  the  whole 

1  New  Orleans,  August  30.  —  "  In  view  of  the  numerous  strikes  here 
and  the  still  greater  number  threatened  in  the  building  trades,  the  archi- 
tects, builders,  and  contractors  have  taken  preliminary  steps  to  protect 
themselves  against  further  disturbances  by  calling  a  mass  meeting  of 
master  builders  and  of  employers  in  affiliated  trades.  It  is  openly  an- 
nounced that  the  purpose  of  the  meeting  is  to  declare  war  against  the 
unions,  and  to  begin  the  war  at  once  instead  of  waiting  for  the  unions 
to  strengthen  themselves  and  precipitate  a  strike  when  they  get  ready, 
which  it  is  understood  is  their  plan." 


40  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

energy  that  now  goes  to  the  union  will  turn  to  an 
aggressive  political  socialism.  It  will  not  be  the 
harmless  sympathy  with  increased  city  and  state 
functions  which  trade  unions  already  feel;  it  will 
become  a  turbulent  political  force  bent  upon  using 
every  weapon  of  taxation  against  the  rich. 

Those  who  represent  the  interests  of  capital  must 
make  the  choice.  With  magnificent  energy  they  have 
created  an  industrial  organization  that  no  other  na- 
tion now  matches.  Will  they  use  some  fair  portion 
of  this  strength  to  complete  this  principle  of  organiza- 
tion so  that  it  includes  those  who  help  them  do  their 
work  ?  or  will  they,  in  the  fighting  spirit  of  compe- 
tition under  which  they  were  bred,  insist  upon  an 
unrestrained  and  unmodified  mastery?  No  skill  in 
ornamental  institutions  of  the  Cash  Register  type 
will  suffice.  It  is  conceivable  that  a  genuine  applica- 
tion of  profit-sharing,  or  a  systematized  distribution 
of  safe  stock  among  the  men,  would  go  far  to  free 
industry  from  much  dangerous  friction.  Two  of  our 
foremost  business  men  have  given  special  attention  to 
this  last  proposal.  Neither  is  likely  to  try  it  from  a 
lurking  fear  of  ugly  reaction  among  the  men  in  case 
the  stock  should  depreciate.  Both  think  the  scheme 
of  profit  sharing  too  sentimental  and  too  difficult  to 
put  upon  a  secure  business  basis.  They  admit  that 
many  experiments  of  this  character  are  possible  with 
semi-public  corporations  like  the  railroads  and  street 
cars,  but  with  private  industries  subject  to  all  manner 
of  unforeseen  fluctuations  on  the  market,  together 
with  the  suspicious  opposition  of  the  trade  union  to 
all  plans  for  binding  the  laborer  to  the  employer's 
business,  the  difficulties  appear  too  great.  One  of 


SOME  GENERALITIES  41 

them  said  :  "  The  truth  is,  modern  business  is  a  fight, 
and  is  likely  to  remain  so.  At  bottom  it  is  a  ques- 
tion of  strength  and  courage,  with  as  much  tact  as 
we  can  get  into  it."  It  has,  alas !  to  be  added  to  this, 
that  the  strain  of  the  competitive  struggle  (now  that 
it  has  taken  on  an  international  character)  is  so  inex- 
orable that  they  have  neither  time  nor  strength  for 
projects  that  are  not  quite  business,  and  the  results  of 
which  are  at  best  uncertain. 

The  conduct  of  the  employers  in  the  recent  coal 
strike  has  gone  far  to  convert  thousands  of  hard- 
headed  men  to  the  necessity  of  some  form  of  com- 
pulsory arbitration  to  supplement  what  voluntary 
arbitration  can  effect.  At  the  point  where  the  help- 
lessness of  the  voluntary  principle  grows  clear,  the 
public,  if  once  roused,  turns  to  the  state. 

Yet,  one  by  one,  other  communities  are  yielding  to 
New  Zealand's  example.  Victoria  adopts  it  after 
most  critical  examination.  Sir  Edmund  Barton,  re- 
cently in  this  country,  says,  "  I  think  that  we  in  Aus- 
tralia are  very  much  in  advance  of  your  country  in 
the  matter  of  dealing  with  industrial  conditions.  By 
the  terms  of  our  arbitration  law  great  strikes  are 
made  practically  impossible.  Arbitration  is  compul- 
sory .  .  .  and  since  the  enactment  of  this  compul- 
sory arbitration  law,  strikes  in  New  South  Wales  are 
unknown." 

Even  if  we  are  driven  to  this,  the  same  perplexity 
rises  as  in  the  case  of  trade-union  incorporation; 
the  suspicion  of  the  trade  union  already  shows  itself 
in  opposition. 

The  trade  union  in  New  Zealand  is  not  afraid  of 
the  government  or  of  the  courts.  Our  own  trade 


42  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

unions  are  suspicious  of  the  courts,  and  will  not  trust 
their  verdicts  in  arbitration  cases.1 

If,  then,  it  is  "  a  fight  and  is  likely  to  remain  so  " ; 
if  the  great  forces  of  capitalism  are  to  be  so  used  as 
to  defeat  the  complete  organization  of  labor  along 
lines  that  capital  is  taking  for  its  own  protection ;  if 
the  devices  of  applied  profit  sharing,  stock  distribu- 
tion, and  arbitration  are  to  be  narrowed  to  the  excep- 
tional and  less  important  instances,  must  we  in  the 
last  resort  trust  to  the  educated  magnanimity  of  the 
rich  ? 

The  Le  Play  societies  in  France,  as  well  as  the  brill- 
iant group  of  English  positivists,  have  urged  this 
remedy  for  a  generation,  "the  moralization  of  the 
employer."  The  masses,  they  tell  us,  are  too  difficult 
to  manage,  therefore  concentrate  upon  the  employer. 
Teach  him  that  he  is  a  trustee  of  public  as  well  as  of 
private  interests.  There  is  great  nobility  in  this  teach- 
ing, and  signs  are  everywhere  that  individual  magnates 
are  responding  to  this  public  expectation.  Hospitals, 
colleges,  libraries,  largesses  of  all  sorts,  add  rare  dis- 
tinction to  our  age. 

Two  observations  must  however  be  made,  (i)  If 
one  go  to  that  list,  which  all  have  seen,  of  four  thou- 
sand multi-millionnaires  whose  combined  possessions 
are  believed  to  be  beyond  sixteen  thousand  millions, 
it  will  be  found  that  a  startlingly  small  minority  has 
apparently  ever  heard  of  this  fair  gospel  of  public 
trusteeship.  In  many  other  cases  of  princely  grants 
to  public  objects,  it  is  certain  that,  at  most,  but  a  part 

1  In  a  copy  of  the  National  Labor  Tribune  I  find  these  words, 
"  Compulsory  arbitration  is  a  dream  of  fools  when  it  is  not  a  pawn  of 
knaves." 


SOME  GENERALITIES  43 

of  the  yearly  income  has  been  parted  with.  (2)  The 
other  observation,  weightier  still,  is  that  no  possible 
munificence  in  public  donations  affects  or  has  any 
relation  to  the  sources  of  trouble  in  which  the  social 
question  has  its  origin.  We  suffer  for  want  of  a  wise 
and  patient  organization  between  employer  and  em- 
ployed by  means  of  which  labor  shall  have  the  same 
rights  as  capital.  The  managers  tell  us  that  free 
competition  is  their  ruin.  They  must  have  federated 
organizations  to  protect  them  from  capricious  and  un- 
manageable cutting  of  prices.  Economist  and  busi- 
ness man  alike  admit  upon  the  whole  the  justice  of 
the  claim.  But  if  the  facts  of  the  labor  market  are 
really  faced,  the  immensity  of  our  immigration  chok- 
ing the  avenues  of  unskilled  labor,  who  can  deny 
that  competition  among  laborers  may  be  turned 
against  them  with  the  same  killing  effect  as  that 
under  which  capital  suffers  ?  Labor's  need  of  some 
conscious  control  of  competition  is  in  every  point  as 
true  and  as  easily  justified  as  that  of  capital.  For 
this  the  trade  union  stands.  The  man  who  defeats 
this  right  with  one  hand,  while  he  builds  with  the 
other  a  public  institution,  does  not  render  the  service 
for  which  our  need  is  most  urgent.  We  are  glad  of  his 
charity  and  good  will;  we  should  rejoice  far  more,  if 
he  were  to  recognize  among  his  helpers  every  right  of 
combination  which  he  himself  claims,  and  give  of  his 
superior  strength  to  make  the  complete  organization 
effective. 

It  is  the  writer's  belief  that,  for  reasons  already 
given,  efficient  and  regulative  legislation  will  be  too 
long  defeated  by  competing  local  interests  and  by 
consequent  political  timidities.  If,  then,  we  are  to 


44  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

expect  so  little  from  the  other  remedies  noted;  if  these 
failures  are  likely  to  be  the  occasion,  and  even  the 
instigator,  of  an  unceasing  social  unrest,  to  what  hopes 
can  we  look  ?  It  is  here  assumed  that  the  unrest  will 
become  more  consciously  and  more  definitely  social- 
istic. Socialism  will  become  an  influence  among  us 
that  will  compel  much  more  than  dilettante  curiosity 
and  academic  discussion.  Whether  its  increase  is  to 
bring  us  blessings  or  curses  turns  largely  upon  the 
spirit  in  which  it  is  met.  No  strong  people  will  yield 
to  it  without  a  long  and  desperate  struggle.  But  with 
what  weapons  shall  the  conflict  be  waged  ?  It  is  the 
writer's  chief  hope  in  these  studies  to  show  that  every 
claim  of  socialism  may  be  challenged  and  opposed 
in  ways  that  are  not  only  free  from  danger,  but  are 
in  their  very  nature  educational  and  fortifying  at  the 
very  points  where  our  citizenship  is  weakest.  For 
the  first  time  in  history  it  is  possible  to  subject  so- 
cialistic experiments  to  the  tests  of  experience.  To- 
ward the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  something 
like  a  final  judgment  had  been  passed  upon  the 
socialism  of  the  Utopias.  None  more  than  the  abler 
socialists  now  condemn  the  "dream  excursion  "  of  the 
separate  colony. 

During  the  last  twenty  years,  experience  has  been 
accumulating  which  enables  one  to  reach  another 
and  still  more  important  judgment  about  collectivist 
ideals.  At  least  seven  countries  have  now  entered 
upon  a  conflict  with  those  whose  propaganda  is  to 
substitute  the  collective  ownership  of  the  means  of 
production  for  private  ownership.  In  every  instance 
where  socialists  have  been  given  or  have  won  for 
themselves  specific  and  continuous  responsibilities, 


SOME  GENERALITIES  45 

some  remarkable  results  are  now  clearly  observable. 
It  is  with  these,  and  with  conclusions  based  upon  them, 
that  the  final  chapters  on  Socialism  deal. 

But  every  radical  change  that  socialistic  reorgani- 
zation implies,  cannot  be  understood  apart  from  its 
relation  to  certain  questions  of  fact  and  of  speculation. 
These  will  therefore  first  claim  our  attention. 


CHAPTER  II 

POLITICS   AND   BUSINESS 

THERE  are  roughly  three  points  of  view  in  the  social 
question :  that  of  the  employer,  that  of  the  laborer, 
and  that  of  the  public  which  includes  them  both. 
"  Social  politics "  takes  for  granted  that  the  social 
welfare  is  above  either  of  these  partial  interests.  It 
is  politics  of  the  common  good  rather  than  that 
of  any  class  or  party.  Into  it  has  entered  all  those 
regulative  measures  which  extend  and  adapt  what 
was  first  called  factory  legislation. 

In  no  country  of  the  first  rank  is  this  legislation 
so  weak  as  in  the  United  States.  Nowhere  is  there 
such  fatal  lack  of  unity,  and  nowhere  is  it  so  easy  to 
discredit  sound  legislative  proposals  by  the  fear  that 
local  business  will  suffer.  This  half  paralysis  of 
legislation  that  is  really  social ;  that  guards  labor  as 
carefully  as  it  guards  capital,  is  the  more  unhappy  in 
its  results  because  large  commercial  interests  never 
used  the  government  for  its  private  ends  with  more 
unconcealed  audacity  than  among  ourselves.  Here, 
too,  the  laborer  is  learning  the  uses  to  which  govern- 
ment and  politics  may  be  put.  Looking  to  the  city 
and  government  for  help  has  been  taught  to  the  com- 
mon people  by  the  most  successful  business  men  in 
this  country. 

Our  magnates  of  industry  have  not  preached  pater- 
46 


POLITICS  AND   BUSINESS  47 

nalism,  but,  in  season  and  out  of  season,  they  have 
practised  it.  They  have  practised  it  so  long  and  so 
openly,  and  with  such  conspicuous  profit  to  them- 
selves, that  it  is  grotesque  drollery  for  them  to  cry 
out  against  paternal  legislation.  They  have  not 
merely  looked  to  the  government  to  assist  their  enter- 
prises, they  have  taken  possession  of  it.  Hat  in 
hand,  they  have  begged  with  such  importunity  that 
the  law-making  power,  federal,  state,  and  municipal, 
seems  to  have  been  looked  upon  as  a  private  pre- 
serve. Yet  these  who  discovered  paternalism  and 
reduced  it  to  a  political  art  and  method,  never  fail  to 
raise  the  alarm  when  the  humbler  classes  ask  legis- 
lative aid  of  city  or  state.  No  lackey  was  ever  more 
subservient  to  his  master  than  Pennsylvania  to  its 
railroads,  or  than  the  state  of  California  to  the  South- 
ern Pacific.'  These  corporations  have  owned  the 
states,  as  the  landlords  in  England  owned  the  rotten 
boroughs  before  the  reform.  Does  it  lack  any  ele- 
ment of  the  comic  to  hear,  a  few  years  since,  a  presi- 
dent of  that  California  corporation  censure  the 
"dangerous  tendency  of  crying  out  to  the  govern- 
ment for  aid  "  ?  What  past  master  of  the  art  of  a 
triumphant  paternalism  in  the  West  could  for  a 
moment  match  this  gentleman  ?  The  East  and  Mid- 
dle West  are  filled  with  his  peers,  who  have  given 
object  lessons  in  paternalism  to  the  masses,  so  con- 
tinuous and  so  convincing  that  they  would  be  dullards 
if  they  did  not  at  last  profit  by  their  drill-masters' 
example. 

A  specific  and  whimsical  illustration  of  this  comes 
again  from  the  hard-coal  region  in  which  Pennsyl- 
vania republicans  have  preached  the  doctrines  of 


48  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

protection.  "  Give  us  the  fenced  security  of  the  tariff, 
shut  off  foreign  competition  with  our  own  products, 
and  then  will  it  be  well  with  our  workmen,  then 
shall  they  delight  in  steady  work  and  high  wages." 
With  this  fair  promise  on  the  lips,  what  do  they  forth- 
with proceed  to  do  ?  With  their  own  manufacturing 
products  hedged  about,  with  their  own  interests  pro- 
tected, they  proceed,  as  if  for  the  gayety  of  nations, 
to  open  every  flood-gate  for  low-class  foreign  immi- 
gration to  keep  down  the  price  of  what  the  workmen 
have  to  sell,  their  daily  labor.  This  product  of  life 
tissue  shall  forsooth  have  no  protection.  "We,  the 
masters,  will  have  it  for  our  wares,  but  our  laborers 
for  their  wares  shall  not  have  it." 

In  that  unhappy  anthracite  country  the  employers 
will  tell  you  openly  and  with  unconscious  bravado, 
that  they  must  get  in  cheaper  and  cheaper  labor  to 
keep  wages  down,  else  they  could  make  no  money. 

These  realists  of  paternalism  are  among  the  lead- 
ing causes  of  populist  and  socialist  books.  The  Bel- 
lamys are  at  most  a  foot-note  on  their  ampler  page. 
If  paternalism  is  growing,  we  at  least  know  where 
thanks  primarily  are  due. 

The  practical  obverse  of  this  paternalism  is  the 
socialistic  sentiment  among  the  working  classes,  which 
strengthens  day  by  day  for  many  reasons,  but  for  no 
reason  just  now  more  than  this:  the  refusal  of  so 
many  quasi-public  corporations  to  accept  proper  social 
control.  They  refuse  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  they 
have  received,  direct  from  the  hand  of  the  public, 
the  chief  strategic  advantages  which  secure  their  best 
business  gains. 

There  are  few  sources  of  socialistic  unrest  so  open 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  49 

and  prolific  as  the  check  which  the  commercially 
powerful  put  upon  legislation  that  is  disinterested, 
that  is  social  in  its  proper  sense.  Interests  that  will 
prevent  an  income  tax  and  use  a  high  tariff  to  aug- 
ment the  privileges,  not  of  struggling  industries,  but 
of  the  most  masterful  business  corporations  in  the 
world,  breed  discontent,  and  then  turn  it  straight 
toward  the  most  risky  and  premature  forms  of 
socialism. 

A  single  illustration  may  show  what  is  meant  by 
the  sure  coming  of  these  questions  into  the  field  of 
politics,  under  the  pressure  of  social  unrest.  We  are 
grossly  behind  most  civilized  people  in  our  entire 
treatment  of  industrial  accidents.  It  is  immediately 
possible  to  remove  the  most  flagrant  of  these  injustices 
by  extending  legal  regulation  based  on  the  most  defi- 
nite practical  experience  of  at  least  four  other  coun- 
tries. These  humane  provisions  are  now  defeated 
among  us  by  narrow  business  interests.  The  federal 
government  is  powerless,  and  the  separate  states  un- 
willing to  give  an  advantage  to  a  competing  state. 
When  the  miners  of  Pennsylvania  try  to  get  the  most 
elementary  Employers'  Liability  Act,  they  are  told 
before  a  legislative  committee  that  it  will  harm  local 
industry.  The  recent  attempts  to  improve  the  law  in 
New  York  were  met  by  the  objection  that  it  would 
drive  business  into  New  Jersey. 

The  penalty  that  we  shall  pay  for  these  defeats  and 
delays  is  almost  certain  to  be  an  unseasonable  demand 
in  this  country  for  types  of  socialistic  legislation  for 
which  we  are  not  equipped.  Our  obdurate  refusal  to 
organize  proper  compensation  acts  for  the  victims  of 
industrial  injuries  will  soon  raise  the  serious  cry  in 


5O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

our  midst  for  state  pensions.  It  is  safe  to  predict  that 
the  next  considerable  business  depression  will  raise 
the  issue  of  "  old  age  pensions."  Two  influences  will 
hasten  this  issue :  (i)  the  unjust  and  bungling  charac- 
ter of  our  present  laws  for  indemnifying  accidents,  and 
(2)  the  rapidity  with  which  men  still  in  middle  life  are 
set  aside  in  favor  of  young  men  in  many  of  the  great- 
est industries.  (In  the  chapter  on  Machinery  the  fact 
will  be  considered  with  proof  and  more  detail.)  The 
man  of  fifty,  if  displaced  in  time  of  prosperity,  may 
find  employment,  but  the  moment  the  demand  for 
labor  is  arrested,  these  evils  will  show  themselves  in 
every  industrial  city  in  the  United  States.  No  people 
ever  mismanaged  government  pensions  with  that  head- 
long and  promiscuous  wastefulness  which  has  been  the 
humiliation  of  our  system  since  the  Civil  War.  Our 
wealth  has  been  such  that  the  good-natured  extrava- 
gance has  not  despoiled  us;  but  to  arrange  old  age 
pensions  for  workingmen,  with  a  hundredth  part  of 
the  recklessness  that  has  marked  our  pensioning  of 
soldiers,  would  bankrupt  any  workingmen's  pension 
scheme  ever  devised. 

We  have  not  yet  won  the  administrative  habits  that 
make  this  vast  and  delicate  responsibility  safe.  Yet 
the  premature  proposal  will  be  thrust  upon  us  all  the 
more  impetuously,  because  we  refuse  to  take  the  first 
clear  steps  to  do  justly  through  more  adequate  com- 
pensation acts.  The  best  lesson  England  has  to  teach 
us  in  the  social  question  is  the  steadying  and  whole- 
some reaction  of  her  progressive  factory  legislation 
upon  her  spirit  of  industrial  unrest.  This  whole  body 
of  regulative  measures  has  saved  her  from  a  revolution; 
it  has  saved  her  from  any  violent  form  of  socialism ; 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  51 

tempering  this  sect  so  that  socialist  demands  in  that 
country  are  merely  the  frontier  requisitions  of  her 
advanced  politics.1 

A  coal  operator,  at  first  friendly  to  the  Civic  Federa- 
tion, turned  after  the  miners'  victory  of  1900  into  the 
most  sarcastic  critic,  because  "the  meddling  of  that 
body  of  theorists  brought  politics  into  our  business." 
"  No  array  of  bigwigs,"  he  said,  "  shall  help  us  run 
our  business  by  the  help  of  politics."  He  insisted 
that  the  trade  unions  could  have  been  beaten  easily 
enough  but  for  the  impertinence  of  this  political 
meddling. 

It  is  true  that  the  political  situation  of  the  moment 
was  used  to  win  that  miners'  strike  of  1900.  It  is  as 
true  that  business  administration  would  be  appallingly 
embarrassed  if,  in  every  row  between  capital  and 
labor,  hopeful  appeal  could  be  made  to  the  politician. 
Yet  this  formidable  perplexity  has  at  last  been  reached 
in  the  United  States.  Politics,  in  its  proper  and  larger 
definition,  will  more  and  more  interfere  with  certain 
forms  of  business.  When  the  public  is  disturbed  enough 
by  strike  disorders,  it  will  interfere  politically.  The 

1  For  an  illustration  let  the  reader  turn  to  Engles's  powerful  descrip- 
tion, "The  Condition  of  the  Working  Class  in  England  in  1844."  I' 
we  except  the  lurid  passages  in  Carlyle's  "  Past  and  Present "  and 
"  Later-Day  Pamphlets,"  and  many  of  the  notes  in  Marx's  "  Capital,"  there 
is  no  such  terrible  arraignment  of  conditions  among  the  laboring  classes 
as  this  book  contains.  It  is  a  mass  of  documentary  testimony  of  the 
extensive  and  intensive  misery  of  the  laboring  classes  generally  ;  but  a 
misery  which  has  been  immeasurably  lessened.  Charles  Kingsley's 
stormy  resentment  against  society  had  its  kindling  from  just  such 
sources  as  these.  Not  twenty  years  after  he  had  written  "  his  problem 
story,"  "  Yeast,"  the  improvement  among  the  workingmen  had  been  so 
great  that  in  the  fourth  edition  of  this  volume  the  author  states  frankly 
how  hopeful  a  change  has  taken  place. 


52  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

kind  of  organization  which  capital  on  the  one  side 
and  labor  on  the  other  has  now  taken  on,  renders  this 
inevitable.  Capital  is  now  centralized  in  producing 
and  distributing  certain  products  that  are  in  the  wid- 
est and  most  common  use,  like  iron,  steel,  sugar, 
meat,  and  coal.  The  very  defmiteness  and  magnitude 
of  the  organization  make  it  an  easy  mark  for  approval 
or  disapproval.  If  the  consumer  thinks  himself 
aggrieved,  he  sees  clearly  the  source  of  his  irritation. 
There  may  be  wholly  legitimate  economic  causes  for 
the  present  rise  of  beef,  but  no  authoritative  and 
disinterested  statement  of  this  has  been  made  to 
the  public,  and  thus  the  cry  rises  in  every  part  of 
the  country  that  the  "  government  look  into  the 
beef  trust,"  that  we  have  in  a  word  political  inter- 
ference. 

To  this  same  end  works  the  increasing  organization 
of  labor.  The  very  mass  and  extent  of  this  organi- 
zation makes  the  ignoring  of  it  by  the  politician  im- 
possible, if  it  actively  court  such  recognition.  It  is 
not  necessary  that  labor  should  try  to  form  an  inde- 
pendent party.  Its  power  may  prove  more  effective 
if  its  growing  political  strength  is  used  to  extort  from 
either  Democrats  or  Republicans  every  advantage  it 
can  gain.  Within  fifteen  years,  in  countries  like 
Switzerland,  Belgium,  and  France,  labor  organization 
has  compelled  a  kind  of  systematic  mixing  of  govern- 
ments in  industrial  affairs.  It  is  but  a  few  years  since 
a  French  premier  contemptuously  refused  to  entertain 
the  proposition  of  government  interference  with  a 
strike.  He  was  forced  to  yield,  and  from  that  day  to 
this  politics  has  played  an  increasing  part  in  those 
special  labor  contests  that  bring  out  the  antagonisms 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  53 

between  political  individualism  and  the  ideals  of 
modern  collectivism.1 

As  late  as  1882,  when  they  were  discussing  in 
France  whether  the  liberty  of  association  should  be 
granted  to  trade  unions,  Le*on  Say  thought  the  social 
question  a  fad  upon  which  serious  statesmen  should 
waste  no  time.  The  last  prime  minister,  Waldeck- 
Rousseau,  set  high  value  upon  Monsieur  Say's  opinion, 
following  it  sedulously,  until  the  socialist  vote  drove 
him  to  a  policy  which  he  pronounced  infamous  as  late 
as  1894.  In  Roanne,  in  1895,  he  told  his  hearers  of 
the  social  destruction  threatened  by  collectivism,  "  les 
ruines  qu'il  peut  faire,"2  and  finally  before  the  repub- 
lican club,  after  the  fall  of  the  Meline  ministry, 
Waldeck-Rousseau  warned  the  party  forces  against 
the  first  step  of  compromise  with  socialists. 

Is  not  this  the  mission  of  le  Grand  Cercle  republi- 
cain,  it  was  asked,  to  prevent  every  affiliation  with 
collectivist  despoilers,  and  to  hold  fast  republican 
principles  in  their  integrity  ?  It  has  never  ceased  to 
excite  merriment  among  his  enemies  that,  once  in 
power,  this  strong  leader  should  so  soon  eat  his  own 
words,  hasten  to  the  socialists  for  help,  and  appoint 
one  of  their  best-known  leaders,  Monsieur  Millerand, 
as  his  minister  of  commerce.  No  one  believes  that 
the  private  opinions  of  Waldeck-Rousseau  upon  the 
merits  of  the  collectivist  programme  had  been  trans- 
formed. His  change  of  front  was  forced  by  the  un- 
expected rise  of  a  new  party  in  French  politics.  The 
socialist  trade  union  had  a  membership,  in  1890,  of 

1  President  Loubet  was  recently  as  busily  engaged  in  trying  to  settle 
a  strike  as  President  Roosevelt. 

2  Discours  le  15  novembre. 


54  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

less  than  140,000,  in  1899  they  numbered  nearly 
500,000.  In  1884  there  were  not  100  of  these  asso- 
ciations in  all  France,  in  1890  there  were  1006,  in 
1899,  268 5. 1  Forty  of  these  unions  have  their  own 
periodicals,  and  nearly  600  have  established  libraries. 
Although  these  unions  represent  but  half  the  socialist 
strength  of  the  country,  their  clubs  are  so  organized 
in  hundreds  of  French  cities  that  they  exercise  an 
influence  which  no  party  manager  can  now  ignore. 

The  president  of  the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  Mon- 
sieur Deschanel,  is  reported  to  have  said,  "  I  owe  my 
position  chiefly  to  the  fact  that  I  had  given  a  dozen 
years'  hard  study  to  industrial  and  economic  problems, 
under  the  firm  conviction  that  the  social  question  is 
the  ruling  issue  of  our  time." 

After  two  speeches2  delivered  in  1894,  it  appears 
to  have  been  admitted  in  the  Deputies  that  he  was 
easily  the  most  competent  member  to  cope  with  the 
new  party.  He  openly  admits  that  socialism  repre- 
sents a  powerful,  serious,  and  growing  influence, 
which  politics  must  more  and  more  take  into  account. 
Monsieur  Deschanel  is,  perhaps,  more  critical  of 
political  laissez-faire  than  he  is  of  collectivism.  State 
intervention  in  behalf  of  the  laborer  (not  merely  of 
the  woman  and  child,  but  of  the  man)  he  accepts  as 
a  principle  that  is  to  have  a  far  wider  application. 
He  believes  that  such  interference  may  become  na- 
tional on  a  far  larger  scale.  He  holds  that  la  grande 
Industrie  has  created  a  new  form  of  pauperism  :  —  "a 
engendr6  par  les  chdmages  une  forme  nouvelle  de  pau- 

1  JJAnnuaire  des  Syndicats  Professionnels  pour  igoo. 

2  "  Replique  a  Messieurs  Millerand  et  Jaures "  and  "  Le  Systeme 
Collectiviste." 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  55 

perisme."  He  recognizes,  what  his  older  colleagues 
would  not  see,  that  the  trade  union  has  become  a  per- 
manent part  of  our  industrial  life,  and  should  be 
welcomed.  He  calls  it  the  "  cellule  de  1'organization 
nouvelle  du  travail."  He  admits  every  abuse  that  is 
laid  at  its  doors,  but  insists  that  with  a  bold  and  gen- 
erous treatment  the  trade  union  will  become  a  power- 
ful and  conservative  influence  :  —  "  deviendra,  entre 
des  mains  plus  exercees,  un  puissant  levier  de  pro- 
gres  et  de  justice  sociale." l 

That  socialism — as  curse  or  blessing — might  prove 
to  be  the  great  fact  of  the  twentieth  century,  has  long 
been  felt  by  men  of  philosophic  penetration  who 
wrote  in  the  spirit  of  critical  observers.  I  select 
those  only  who  looked  at  this  oncoming  event  with 
pronounced  aversion,  as  their  testimony  will  carry 
more  weight.  Two  French  writers  of  such  eminence 
as  Edmond  Scherer  and  De  Vogu6  are  both  haunted 
by  the  assurance  that  socialism  is  creeping  upon  us 
like  a  great  shadow.  Nearly  twenty  years  ago  Sena- 
tor Scherer  expressed  deep  repugnance  to  socialism, 
but  wrote,  "all  signs  point  to  the  steady  spread  of 
socialism  within  a  future  that  we  may  all  live  to  see."  2 

In  his  acute  though  sombre  study  of  race  struggles 
Professor  Pearson,  out  of  a  singularly  large  experi- 
ence in  England  and  Australia,  expresses  a  like 
opinion.  This  same  view  appears  in  the  more  pre- 

1  "  La  Question  Sociale  et  Le  Socialisme ; "  Discours  prononce  a 
Carmaux  le  27  decembre,  1896. 

2  "  La  Republique  democratique,  je  ne  puis  m'empecher  de  le  croire 
tend  au  nivellement  des  fortunes,  elle  est  condamnee  a  faire  1'epreuve 
du  communisme,  et  la  seule  chose  que  nous  ayons  a  nous  demander 
c'est  ce  qu'il  faut  attendre  de  cette  tentative."  —  Edmond  Scherer, 
u  La  Democratic  et  La  France,"  1883,  p.  63. 


56  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

tentious  and  widely  read  book  of  Benjamin  Kidd,1 
and  now  Edward  Dicey  of  Oxford,  in  a  dirge  at  the 
grave  of  his  own  liberal  party,  sees  the  gloomy  appa- 
rition of  socialism  rising  on  the  horizon. 

It  is  the  politics  of  this  party,  which  Professor  Dicey 
pronounces  dead  in  England,  that  has  been  a  scorn- 
ful opponent  of  socialism.  More  than  any  other,  it 
came  to  be  the  party  of  modern  capitalism.  Yet  while 
the  strength  of  capitalism  is  unabated,  this  party  in 
country  after  country  has  suffered  crushing  defeats. 
In  the  two  countries  where  socialism  has  won  the 
most  signal  victories,  Belgium  and  Germany,  this 
party  of  the  "politics  of  the  great  industries"  has 
almost  ceased  to  exist.  No  modern  event  of  greater 
consequence  has  happened  in  Europe  than  the  swift 
decay  of  what  is  known  as  political  liberalism.  When 
Professor  Dicey  connects  the  fall  of  his  party  with 
the  rise  of  socialism,  he  indicates  the  chief  event 
with  which  twentieth-century  politics  will  be  con- 
cerned. This  fact  cannot  be  understood  apart  from 
its  relation  to  the  industrial  forces  of  our  time. 

The  great  market,  banking,  industrial,  and  factory 

1  Mr.  Kidd  speaks  of  "  the  only  social  doctrines  current  in  the  ad- 
vanced societies  of  to-day,  which  have  the  assent  of  reason,  for  the 
masses  are  the  doctrines  of  socialism."  In  his  latest  book,  "  Western 
Civilization,"  Mr.  Kidd  brings  the  ideals  of  politics  and  economics  into 
one  category :  "  As  in  politics  the  movement  has  been  toward  equal 
political  rights,  so  in  economics  it  is  now  a  movement  toward  equality 
of  economic  opportunity."  He  quotes  Professor  Sidgwick's  ethical 
postulate,  "  that  the  distribution  of  wealth  in  a  well-ordered  state 
should  aim  at  realizing  political  justice."  This  conscious  identifying 
of  political  and  industrial  ideals  is  a  dangerous  ferment  for  certain 
vested  interests.  Let  it  become  familiar  to  the  common  thought,  and 
some  of  our  sturdiest  formulas  on  "liberty,"  "property,"  "rights," 
must  be  restated. 


POLITICS  AND   BUSINESS  57 

centres  have  created  a  politics  which  reflects  what 
was  believed  to  be  their  interest.  Every  successive 
industrial  type  has  had  its  own  political  form.  No 
one  doubts  that  the  politics  peculiar  to  the  Southern 
states  before  the  Civil  War  was  made  chiefly  by  the 
kind  of  business  carried  on  there  by  slaves. 

There  was  in  England  a  landlord  politics  that  car- 
ried all  before  it  until  the  midland  manufacturing 
cities  grew  powerful  enough  to  force  the  landlords  to 
admit  to  Parliament  those  who  represented  the  new 
interests  of  the  mill  and  factory  towns.  If  a  few 
of  the  largest  businesses  of  Pennsylvania  —  transpor- 
tation, iron,  and  mining  —  were  grouped  together,  and 
then  their  history  faithfully  told,  we  should  know  the 
origin  and  character  of  a  large  part  of  Pennsylvania 
politics.  The  history  of  the  Boston  and  Maine  Rail- 
road in  New  Hampshire  would  be  at  the  same  time 
the  mere  record  of  much  contemporary  politics  in  that 
state.  Very  nearly  all  that  this  railroad  wanted  has 
been  recorded  politically  as  the  will  of  the  people. 
Very  little  of  what  the  people  wanted  has  been  so 
recorded,  if  the  demands  were  thought  to  run  counter 
to  the  interests  of  this  corporation.  The  great  busi- 
ness thus  not  only  sets  its  stamp  on  politics,  it  is  to  a 
large  extent  its  creator  and  controller. 

To  admit  that  political  liberalism  —  the  distinctive 
party  of  capitalism  —  has  been  routed  in  the  most 
highly  developed  countries  of  Europe,  is  to  admit 
that  capitalism  itself,  as  hitherto  managed,  is  under 
criticism.  This  appears  with  still  more  significance  as 
we  note  the  tendency  of  commercial  interests  to  unite 
those  who  have  been  heretofore  in  opposing  political 
parties.  In  Belgium,  where  the  social  question  has 


58  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

become  intense,  thousands  of  business  men,  who  were 
formerly  liberals,  now  vote  with  the  conservatives 
because  business  has  been  frightened  by  the  rise  of 
socialism.  Even  in  our  country  the  half-conscious 
socialism  known  as  populism  has  so  far  developed  as 
to  drive  the  conservative  and  well-to-do  democrats  of 
the  Cleveland,  Whitney,  and  Olney  type  so  close 
to  the  republican  party,  that  much  ingenuity  is  re- 
quired to  prove  any  important  and  lasting  difference 
between  the  two  traditional  foes. 

At  the  South,  the  banker,  the  manufacturer,  the 
railroad  man,  now  tell  you  with  no  hesitation  that 
his  democratic  sympathies  are  gone,  that  his  real 
interests  are  with  the  republicans.  In  Norfolk, 
Virginia,  I  was  told  by  a  man  with  generations  of 
democratic  traditions  in  his  blood,  "  Practically  every 
successful  business  man  of  my  acquaintance  would 
leave  the  democratic  party  if  it  were  not  for  the 
abnormal  situation  which  the  negro  question  imposes 
upon  us.  The  socialistic  nonsense  in  the  democratic 
party  has  shown  thousands  of  men  in  the  South  that 
they  do  not  belong  among  the  democrats."  Every 
mill  and  factory,  every  railroad  and  other  large  cor- 
poration, established  at  the  South,  will  increase  this 
political  sympathy  with  "the  party  of  great  interests." 

The  analogy  between  our  republican  party  and  the 
dying  liberalism  of  Europe  is  extremely  imperfect 
unless  the  splendid  origin  of  both  parties  is  forgotten. 
There  is  far  more  truth  than  error  in  the  analogy,  if 
we  have  in  view  merely  what  these  parties  finally 
came  to  be.  The  Belgian  liberals,  for  instance,  repre- 
sented large  capitalistic  industries.  They  wanted  to 
be  left  alone.  They  were  solemn  in  their  protests 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  59 

against  "  interference,"  whether  of  state  or  the  trade 
unions. 

Only  the  ruins  of  this  party  are  now  left.  Socialist 
aggression  has  driven  the  vested  property  interests 
into  one  common  political  alliance  for  self-defence. 
We  are  now  entering  into  this  same  experience. 

To  the  extent  that  the  republican  party  is  notori- 
ously affiliated  with  leading  business  enterprises, — 
banking,  transportation,  and  the  great  production,  — 
to  the  extent  that  these  enterprises  are  uniting  men 
of  both  party  traditions  against  a  vague  and  fumbling 
socialism,  the  comparison  holds  good. 

Discontent  with  the  actual  industrial  order  is  now 
organized  politically  as  it  is  in  Europe,  and  every 
force  active  among  us  will  add  to  its  strength.  Its 
beginnings  are  thus  far  very  humble.  Periods  of 
unusual  prosperity  will  hold  it  in  check,  but  at  each 
collapse  of  the  business  boom  this  new  idea  will  but 
fasten  the  more  strongly  upon  the  imagination  and 
the  purposes  of  multitudes  of  the  American  people. 

Mr.  Gladstone  is  quoted  as  saying  that  the  chief 
event  of  his  time  was  the  increasing  identification  of 
politics  with  social  questions.  Eight  years  ago  Lord 
Rosebery  said,  "  I  am  certain  that  there  is  a  party 
in  this  country,  unnamed  as  yet,  that  is  disconnected 
with  any  existing  political  organizations  —  a  party 
that  is  inclined  to  say  '  a  plague  on  both  your  houses, 
a  plague  on  all  your  politics,  a  plague  on  all  your 
unending  discussions  that  yield  so  little  fruit.'  "  (St. 
James's  Hall,  March  21,  I894.)1 

1 "  Now,  I  dare  say  the  time  may  come  —  it  may  come  sooner  than 
some  think  —  when  the  liberal  party  will  be  transformed  or  superseded 
by  some  new  party."  —  John  Morley,  Newcastle,  May  21,  1894. 


60  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

The  party  is  not  yet  formed,  but  if  we  may  believe 
so  acute  and  competent  a  scholar  of  world  politics  as 
Mr.  Dicey,  "  liberalism "  is  a  thing  of  the  past  and 
socialism  a  fatality  of  the  future. 

What  is  likely  to  strengthen  this  collectivist  sym- 
pathy is  the  advent  of  the  "trust."  The  process 
of  consolidating  large,  separate  concerns  is  easy  to 
justify  in  theory  and  by  analogies  from  economic 
development.  It  seems  more  than  probable  that 
these  giant  enterprises  will  eventually  adjust  them- 
selves to  the  needs  of  a  world-commerce.  But 
meantime  two  eventful  results  cannot  be  averted. 
The  trust  is  destined  (i)  to  arouse  and  intensify 
socialistic  sentiment  among  classes  to  which  social- 
ism has  hitherto  been  an  object  of  ridicule.  Noth- 
ing can  now  prevent  the  development  of  a  new 
habit  of  appealing  to  the  state  and  government 
to  extend  its  authority  over  these  colossal  under- 
takings. 

The  trust  will  (2)  accustom  the  people  to  bring  poli- 
tics into  the  industrial  field.  The  huge  overcapitali- 
zation, the  taking  and  giving  of  social  privileges,  the 
method  of  organization  so  exclusively  from  the  stock 
exchange  point  of  view,  with  its  excesses  of  specula- 
tion, are  all  calculated  to  play,  with  disquieting  effect, 
on  the  popular  imagination.  The  incidental  evils 
bound  to  follow  these  hurried  aggregations  of  capital 
cannot  quickly  enough  be  brought  under  control. 
Long  intervening  years  must  pass  before  the  trust 
can  prove  safe  for  the  humbler  class  of  investors. 
Popular  approval  will  never  be  secured  until  these 
open  and  obvious  advantages  are  assured.  Capital- 
istic abuses  have  had  one  sure  defence  in  the  past 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  6 1 

behind  which  the  trust  cannot  hide  itself.  The  pub- 
lic eye  is  fastened  upon  it  by  its  very  bigness. 

It  has  never  yet  been  possible  to  concentrate  the 
critical  discontent  definitely  enough  upon  commercial 
abuses.  There  has  been  no  end  of  railing  against  the 
corporations,  but  the  people  have  taken  these  charges 
very  closely  at  their  proper  value.  As  long  as  the 
vilification  of  corporations  is  indiscriminate,  the  com- 
mon sense  of  the  people  will  discount  it  for  the  plain 
reason  that  thousands  of  corporations  (like  our  New 
England  mills  and  factories)  are  fairly  law-abiding 
and  bring  benefits  to  millions  of  our  inhabitants. 
They  are  known  to  be  as  free  from  evil  practices  as 
any  phase  of  our  institutional  life.  To  lump  these 
business  organizations  into  one  common  object  for 
cursing  is  not  merely  unwise,  it  is  dangerous  in  that 
it  muddles  every  issue  upon  which  reform  of  real 
evils  must  depend.  As  long  as  obloquy  is  put  upon 
corporations  in  general,  the  lawless  ones  are  safe. 
Their  percentage  of  the  contumely  is  lightly  borne. 

.With  the  advent  of  the  "trust"  a  new  stage  in 
popular  judgments  has  been  reached.  The  old  hesi- 
tation about  fixing  responsibilities  for  evils,  real  and 
supposed,  will  continue  until  business  ills  again  beset 
us.  In  that  stress,  scores  of  the  weaker  combinations 
will  collapse  and  even  the  strongest  be  hard  driven 
to  meet  the  responsibilities  incurred  by  their  mon- 
strous capitalization.  These  days  will  be  the  days  of 
reckoning  for  the  capitalistic  holders.  There  will  be 
much  unfairness  in  this  popular  judgment.  The 
trust  has  come,  upon  the  whole,  as  inevitably  as  the 
partnership  came  in  its  time,  or  as  the  corporation 
began  to  appear  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century. 


62  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Yet  all  that  can  be  said  for  the  "  naturalness  "  of 
this  trust  evolution  will  not  shield  it  from  one  outbreak 
of  hostile  censure.  Thus  far  there  has  been  a  holding 
of  the  breath  at  the  rapidity  and  magnitude  of  trust 
formation.  The  stupendous  scale  of  it  has  impressed 
the  imagination  as  no  other  event  in  our  industrial 
history:  methods,  salaries,  managers,  promoters,  all 
are  thrust  into  such  fierce  light  and  prominence  that 
popular  attention  will  become  very  embarrassing  in 
that  less  prosperous  period  when  all  the  capitalized 
expectations  have  to  be  fulfilled.  This  element  of 
conspicuousness  ought,  in  theory,  to  sober  those  who 
conduct  these  enterprises.  The  very  rights  under 
which  they  do  business  are  granted  to  them  by  the 
state.  In  season  and  out  of  season,  they  have  told 
the  public  that  the  gathering  of  various  firms  and  cor- 
porations into  one  unified  association  enabled  them 
to  make  extraordinary  economies  by  which  the  con- 
sumer must  profit.  Can  we  think  that  intelligent 
men  will  create  these  expectations  and  then  anger 
the  people  by  higher  prices  ?  If  they  prove  unable 
to  make  economies  that  the  public  can  share,  their 
combination  will  be  pronounced  a  failure ;  if  they 
can  make  economies  but  refuse  to  share  them  in 
cheapened  products,  the  public  will  be  more  critical 
still. 

The  most  popular  error,  however,  is  to  judge  the 
trust  on  its  business  side  alone.  It  has  to  undergo 
another  ordeal  before  public  opinion.  The  trust 
comes  into  the  industrial  struggle  with  privileges  and 
powers  greater  than  ever  have  been  exercised  in  the 
world's  commerce.  To  use  these  powers  with  such 
prudence  and  fairness  as  not  to  outrage  the  sentiment 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  63 

of  the  community,  will  prove  the  severest  test  to 
which  these  combinations  must  submit.  It  is  too 
soon  to  say  what  their  influence  is  to  be  upon  a  great 
multitude  of  small  independent  business  concerns. 
Is  life  to  be  made  harder  for  these,  or  are  they  also 
to  have  some  part  in  "  the  higher  stage  of  evolution  " 
which  the  trust  is  said  to  represent  ?  That  the  trust 
will  throw  out  of  work  armies  of  men,  as  we  are 
often  told,  is  probably  untrue,  but  will  it  slowly  put 
an  army  of  the  more  modest  independent  men  into 
dependent  clerical  positions  ?  It  may  be  said  that 
this  is  unavoidable,  that  it  is  progress  and  in  the  long 
run  socially  best ;  but  that  it  would  create  a  new  class 
of  malcontents  in  American  life  is  very  certain. 

The  most  concrete  impulse  that  now  favors  social- 
ism in  this  country  is  the  inane  purpose  to  deprive 
labor  organizations  of  the  full  and  complete  rights 
that  go  with  federated  unionism.  Capitalism  claims 
and  gets  what  it  refuses  to  labor.  One  of  the  gran- 
dees in  the  business  world,  who  has  publicly  insisted 
upon  "the  rights  of  labor  to  organize,"  was  asked  in 
my  hearing  if  he  were  favorable  to  trade  unionism. 
"  Yes,"  he  said,  "  I  have  always  been  its  friend, 
but  of  course  the  union  must  be  taught  its  proper 
place.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  employer's 
business.  If  it  dictates,  it  is  out  of  its  sphere.  It 
ought  to  confine  itself  to  mutual  helpfulness,  burial 
funds,  and  the  like."  Of  this  kind  of  good  will  to 
organized  labor  employers  have  abundance,  yet  it  may 
conceal  an  absolute  and  settled  aversion  to  every 
real  object  for  which  the  trade  union  stands.  This 
gentleman  had  an  honest  loathing  for  the  actual 
trade  union  when  it  gained  strength  enough  to  offer 


64  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

him  the  alternative  of  arbitration  or  of  a  strike.  He 
had  an  imagined  affection  for  a  ladylike  association 
which  "  knew  its  place,"  that  is,  which  never  ques- 
tioned his  own  absolute  dictatorship.  He  was  fond 
of  saying:  "There  is  no  place  for  arbitration  in  my 
works,  because  I  pay  all  that  the  business  will  afford. 
If  they  ask  me  to  arbitrate,  it  is  like  taking  me  by 
the  throat.  With  a  highwayman  there  can  be  no 
arbitration." 

This  is  upon  the  whole  the  attitude  of  the  business 
managers  in  four-fifths  of  our  unionized  industries. 
From  the  point  of  view  of  capitalist  supremacy  this 
attitude  has  one  threatening  feature. 

This  enmity  of  capital  to  the  trade  union  is  watched 
with  glee  by  every  intelligent  socialist  in  our  midst. 
Every  union  that  is  beaten  or  discouraged  in  its 
struggle  is  ripening  fruit  for  socialism.  We  have 
pleased  ourselves  by  repeating,  parrotlike,  "such 
socialism  as  we  have  in  the  United  States  is  wholly 
of  foreign  origin."  A  few  years  ago  this  explanation 
accounted  fairly  well  for  the  facts.  No  close  observer 
can  any  longer  consider  it  an  explanation.  The  con- 
ditions out  of  which  socialism  grows  are  working  with 
increasing  power  in  our  midst,  and  they  do  not  con- 
veniently select  those  only  who  speak  broken  English, 
or  were  bred  among  "the  tyrannies  of  the  old  world." 
Let  unionism  receive  from  capital  a  severe  and  dam- 
aging blow,  and  socialism  will  bear  henceforth,  not  a 
foreign  but  a  distinctively  American  stamp. 

This  process  has  already  begun.  Strong  trade-union 
cities,  like  Brockton  and  Haverhill  in  Massachusetts, 
to  the  general  bewilderment,  elect  workingmen  social- 
ist mayors.  Their  hold  is  thus  far  slight.  These 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  65 

socialists  were  dropped  after  two  years  in  office,  but 
in  both  cities  the  sentiment  which  elected  them  is  far 
stronger  and  more  confident  than  in  1898-1899.  In 
other  manufacturing  towns  like  Rockland,  it  becomes 
each  year  more  aggressive.  In  1902,  it  sends  a  third 
representative  to  the  State  House,  while  manufactur- 
ing cities  in  Plymouth  County  give  an  enormous  vote 
for  a  socialist  state  senator.1  Among  the  causes 
which  have  brought  these  changes  is  the  purpose  of 
employers  to  cripple  the  trade  unions.  It  may  be  by 
forcing  piece-work  so  that  wages  are  kept  low ;  or  by 
introducing  a  new  machine  like  the  "  laster  "  without 
consulting  or  propitiating  the  union  whose  wage  scale 
is  revolutionized  by  the  new  process.  That  which 
teaches  a  union  that  it  cannot  succeed  as  a  union 
turns  it  toward  socialism.  In  long  strikes  in  towns 
like  Marlboro  and  Brookfield  strong  unions  are  de- 
feated. Hundreds  of  men  leave  these  towns  for 
shoe-centres  like  Brockton,  where  they  are  now  voting 
the  socialist  ticket.  The  socialist  mayor  of  this  city 
tells  me,  "  The  men  who  come  to  us  now  from  towns 
where  they  have  been  thoroughly  whipped  in  a  strike 
are  among  our  most  active  working  socialists."  The 
bitterness  engendered  by  this  sense  of  defeat  turned 
to  politics,  as  it  will  throughout  the  whole  country, 
if  organization  of  labor  is  deprived  of  its  rights. 

When  the  socialist  Chase  was  made  mayor  of 
Haverhill,  the  ablest  local  "  capitalistic  "  paper  made 
this  comment :  — 

1  As  this  goes  to  press,  December  4th,  the  returns  from  Brockton 
show  that  with  the  reelection  of  the  socialist  mayor  by  a  strong  major- 
ity, eight  city  councillors,  three  aldermen,  and  two  members  of  the 
school  board,  all  socialists,  are  also  elected. 
F 


66  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

"Now  that  the  municipal  election  of  1898  has 
passed  into  history,  those  who  profess  horror  of  so- 
cialistic teachings  may  with  advantage  to  themselves 
and  benefit  to  the  community  study  the  election  returns 
with  anxious  solicitude.  They  will  find  therein  food 
for  thought.  The  vote  of  yesterday  means  far  more 
than  the  bare  figures  indicate.  It  comes  as  a  solemn 
warning  that  the  people  are  dissatisfied  with  conditions 
which  make  for  their  political  degradation ;  that  they 
have  grown  impatient  of  low  wages  and  lack  of  em- 
ployment, and  may  be  counted  upon  in  the  future  to 
act  independently  of  all  political)  parties  unless  there 
be  a  change  both  of  methods  and  of  men  in  the  legis- 
lative chambers  of  nation,  state,  and  city.  Is  it  any 
wonder  these  people  have  lost  confidence  in  the  hon- 
esty of  those  chosen  to  direct  their  affairs  when  they 
see  piling  up  on  every  side  immense  aggregations 
of  wealth  which  is  used  to  control  the  necessaries  of 
life,  while  their  daily  wage  grows  smaller  ?  " 

These  are  puny  beginnings.  Our  social  democracy 
is  still  too  much  at  sea  to  put  before  the  people 
a  clear  and  coherent  statement  of  principles.  These 
are,  however,  slowly  taking  shape,  while  the  plat- 
form of  our  conventional  politicians,  like  that  of 
European  liberalism,  drifts  year  by  year  into  phrase- 
making  that  shows  upon  its  face  the  fatal  lack  of 
great  and  positive  purpose.  The  conventional  poli- 
tics has  reached  that  first  stage  of  decay  —  the  apolo- 
getic and  defensive  attitude.  The  new  politics  of  the 
social  democracy  has,  at  least,  the  spirit  of  positive 
and  creative  action. 

As  the  attenuated  difference  between  republican 
and  "  Cleveland  democrat  "  disappears,  conservative 


POLITICS  AND  BUSINESS  67 

and  large  property  interests,  careless  of  party  tradi- 
tions, will  band  together  against  this  common  foe. 
Our  first  need  is  to  know  how  to  meet  the  new  occa- 
sions which  this  appeal  to  the  state  brings  with  it. 

An  attempt  is  made  in  the  following  chapters  to 
throw  light  on  the  most  important  phases  of  the  strug- 
gle upon  which  we  are  entering.  I  believe  that  recent 
developments  of  socialism  and  trade  unionism  in 
this  country  furnish  all  the  guidance  we  require 
both  as  to  temper  and  method  of  coping  with  them. 
Before  passing  to  this  more  definite  investigation 
of  the  socialist  programme,  certain  preliminary  in- 
quiries must  be  made  as  to  the  nature  of  the  "  social 
question,"  and  the  real  purpose  of  those  who  attack 
the  present  industrial  order.  Our  first  inquiry  should 
be  directed  to  the  primary  fact  of  discontent.  No 
age  ever  had  a  social  question  apart  from  some 
deep  undercurrent  of  exasperated  sentiment  against 
the  prevailing  social  order.  There  is  in  our  age  no 
more  "  social  question  "  than  there  is  discontent  with 
the  kind  of  society  in  which  we  live.  The  extent 
and  nature  of  this  unrest  is  therefore  our  immediate 
concern. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE   SOCIAL    UNREST 


WHAT  we  call  rather  loosely  the  social  question  has 
its  invariable  origin  in  some  form  or  degree  of  popu- 
lar discontent.  It  is  the  purpose  of  this  chapter  to 
analyze  the  nature  of  our  own  social  unrest ;  to  mark 
some  of  its  more  undeniable  tendencies ;  to  ask  if  it 
is  growing,  or,  if  not  growing,  is  it  taking  on  any 
threatening  peculiarity  to  justify  alarm  ?  Can  it  be 
maintained  that  ours  is  an  unrest  different  in  any 
essential  from  the  ferment  which  for  centuries  has 
stirred  the  heart  and  the  imagination  of  humanity  ? 
In  the  current  literature  on  social  and  industrial  ques- 
tions nothing,  even  by  economists  of  repute,  is  more 
commonly  asserted. 

The  interpretation  of  the  unrest  (does  it  bode  good 
or  ill  ?)  varies  with  the  mood  of  the  writer.  To  one 
it  augurs  the  approach  of  swift-footed  evils ;  to  another 
each  industrial  struggle  foretells  the  birth  of  a  more 
robust  society.  Whatever  the  interpretation,  it  is  in 
the  interest  of  clearness  to  get  first  some  light  upon 
the  inquiry  :  Is  the  unrest  now  deeper  than  that  which 
has  marked  the  aspiration  of  most  Western  races? 
There  is  much  to  make  us  believe  that  primitive 
peoples  everywhere  are  fairly  content.  However 

68 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  69 

hard  and  pinched  their  condition,  it  does  not  become 
a  source  of  chronic  agitation  for  social  progress. 
Neither  do  we  associate  discontent  with  oriental 
life  and  tradition.  Religion  and  custom  unite  to 
soothe  these  dreaming  millions  into  acquiescence. 
One  country  offers  just  now  an  exception.  In  Japan 
the  spell  is  broken.  For  her  making  or  unmaking, 
the  current  we  call  civilization  has  borne  her  from 
her  moorings.  Her  religion  is  now  to  imitate  the 
West.  She  is  impatient  for  railroads,  for  the  stock 
exchange,  for  mills,  for  electric  plants,  for  markets, 
and  alas  !  for  naval  and  military  furnishings  to  further 
and  protect  the  new  ventures.  All  this  gets  our 
praise.  We  say :  "  Japan  is  at  last  waking  from  a 
sleep.  It  is  '  enterprise,'  the  beginning  of  great 
things."  At  the  very  start  observers  are  telling  us 
the  price  these  people  are  to  pay  for  their  huckster- 
ing in  the  world  market.  The  very  daintiest  of  her 
gifts  are  being  despoiled :  the  capacity  to  work  and 
live  with  a  quiet  spirit;  a  grace  and  gentleness  of 
manner  that  make  our  civilized  behavior  rude  and 
awkward  in  comparison ;  and  most  grievous  of  all, 
the  quick  decay  of  her  exquisite  art.  The  undis- 
turbed leisure  for  loving  and  perfect  workmanship 
is  already  so  blighted  that  the  very  hope  of  pre- 
serving it  is  in  peril.  Some  far-off  compensation 
for  these  losses  will  doubtless  come,  meantime  the 
message  from  Japan  is  that  she  presents  an  easy 
object  lesson  of  a  people  passing  rapidly  from  the 
relative  content  of  the  East  to  the  hustling  self- 
assertion  of  the  West.  We  shall  henceforth  in- 
evitably associate  Japan  with  the  discontent  of 
progress. 


7O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

All  progress  thus  carries  with  it  its  own  disquie- 
tude. Where  the  highest  pace  is  set,  there  discontent 
with  actual  achievement  appears  to  be  keenest.  No 
age,  for  instance,  has  ever  poured  out  such  wealth  of 
energy  upon  education  as  our  own;  none  has  ever 
tried  so  hard,  or  paid  so  lavishly,  to  carry  to  the 
whole  people  every  form  of  intellectual  opportunity, 
yet  never  in  history  was  critical  discontent  with  edu- 
cation so  captious  and  all-pervasive  as  at  present. 
A  well-known  English  educator  reading  a  mass  of 
recent  books  and  articles  by  the  more  prominent  of 
our  teachers,  and  attending  several  important  edu- 
cational meetings,  has  just  said,  "  One  would  think  by 
the  vehemence  of  the  criticism  that  education  in  the 
United  States  was  in  the  last  stages  of  deterioration." 

Even  if  unrest  has  grown,  it  need  not  of  course 
imply  discouragement.  A  period  or  a  people  wholly 
free  from  the  hungers  which  break  into  expressions 
of  discontent  would  be  characterized  as  lacking  the 
first  elements  of  vigorous  and  hardy  life.  Dates  like 
that  of  the  English  reform  movement  of  1832  recall 
times  of  unusual  agitation,  nevertheless  no  one  would 
deny  to  these  brave  days  the  inspiration  of  immense 
social  development.  The  more  general  outbreak  of 
1848  brought  with  it  deeper  turmoil  still,  yet  many  of 
the  most  hopeful  changes  which  we  associate  with 
race  improvement  date  from  this  revolutionary  epoch. 
Modern  history  is  crowded  with  upheavals ;  the  Peas- 
ants' Revolt  of  the  fourteenth  century  ;  the  economic 
disturbances  in  England  in  the  sixteenth  century; 
and  again,  what  is  known  as  the  Industrial  Revolu- 
tion, that  began  in  the  latter  part  of  the  eighteenth 
century  and  extended  far  into  the  nineteenth.  Our 


THE   SOCIAL  UNREST  71 

own  present  uneasiness,  thrown  upon  this  intenser 
background,  appears  tame  and  colorless.  Compared 
with  the  Reformation,  our  spirit  of  protest  is  fitful  and 
uncertain,  while  if  comparison  is  made  between  our 
own  generation  and  the  generation  that  closed  the 
eighteenth  century  in  Europe,  with  its  volcanic  shocks 
of  revolution,  we  are  stolid  and  well-behaved.  In 
current  discussion  upon  religious,  educational,  and 
political  topics,  no  phrase  is  more  certain  to  be  used 
than  this,  "  Yes,  but  we  are  living  in  an  age  of  tran- 
sition," implying  that  the  peculiar  instability  of  things 
at  the  present  moment  is  exceptional.  So  far  as  the 
phrase  has  any  significance,  it  can  mean  only  that 
certain  events,  upon  which  the  eye  is  fixed,  are  mov- 
ing with  quickened  step.  Yet  who  could  select  a 
decade  since  the  landing  at  Jamestown  that  was  not 
a  "  time  of  transition  "  ? 

The  claim  is  still  insistent  that  our  agitations  are 
exceptional  and  full  of  perils.  It  is  therefore  wiser  to 
challenge  the  facts ;  to  see  if  possible  what  truth  the 
claim  contains.  Far-off  periods  will  be  avoided. 
They  offer  too  many  pitfalls  for  misleading  analo- 
gies. There  is  even  danger  in  appeals  to  other  coun- 
tries, because  too  many  differences  of  race  and 
circumstance  are  introduced. 

We  turn  therefore  to  our  own  home  records,  select- 
ing for  comparison  events  and  years  enough  to  make 
a  basis  for  calculation.  Discontent  continuous  in 
intensity  is  found  at  no  time  and  among  no  people. 
From  the  earliest  of  our  permanent  settlements  its 
fevers  are  chronic,  alternating  with  periods  of  con- 
scious rest  and  well-being.  Before  the  middle  of  the 


72  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

seventeenth  century  social  life  in  America  was  too 
new  and  too  unstable  to  offer  safe  illustrations.  A 
better  beginning  may  be  made  with  the  Virginia  col- 
ony after  its  destiny  is  so  far  fixed  that  there  is  no 
thought  of  abandoning  this  country.  To  the  extent 
that  it  can  be  done  with  fairness,  those  special  causes 
of  unrest  that  have  much  in  common  with  our  own 
troubles  will  be  chosen. 

What  signs  are  at  hand  to-day  of  more  extreme 
uneasiness  than  those  observable  in  the  South  during 
a  large  part  of  Berkeley's  reign,  from  1661,  includ- 
ing the  outbreak  known  as  Bacon's  Rebellion  ?  The 
cause  of  the  poor  against  the  rich  had  great  part  in 
that  picturesque  hero's  plucky  fight.  Theft  and  ex- 
tortion by  those  in  power  were  notorious.  Those 
in  high  places  became  rapidly  rich,  and  the  people 
were  cruelly  overtaxed.  There  had  been  a  period  of 
business  depression  more  distressing  than  any  known 
in  our  time.  There  was  political  and  business  cor- 
ruption that  no  Tammany  brave  would  now  dream  of 
venturing.  Heady  attacks  on  property  were  the  or- 
der of  the  day,  and  one  charge  against  Bacon's  fol- 
lowers was  that  they  were  a  "  lawless  rabble  poisoned 
by  communistic  notions."  1 

The  years  preceding  the  Rebellion  were  such  as 
are  commonly  called  "hard  times."  People  felt  poor 
and  saw  fortunes  made  by  corrupt  officials ;  the  fault 
was  with  the  Navigation  Act  and  with  the  debauched 
civil  service  of  Charles  II.  and  Berkeley.  Besides 
these  troubles  which  were  common  to  all,  the  poorer 
people  felt  oppressed  by  taxation  in  regard  to  which 
they  seemed  to  get  no  service  in  return. 

1  "  Old  Virginia  and  her  Neighbors,"  p.  104. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  73 

The  worst  of  present-day  monopolies  are  mild 
when  compared  to  those  through  which  the  English 
merchants  robbed  the  Virginians.  To  the  economic 
troubles  must  be  added  religious  and  educational  com- 
plaints. To  their  demands  for  schools  and  greater  free- 
dom in  the  pulpit,  Berkeley  replied  :  "  The  ministers 
should  pray  oftener  and  preach  less.  But,  I  thank 
God,  there  are  no  free  schools  nor  printing;  and  I 
hope  we  shall  not  have  these  hundred  years;  for 
learning  has  brought  disobedience  and  heresy  and 
sects  into  the  world,  and  printing  has  divulged  them, 
and  libels  against  the  best  government.  God  keep 
us  from  both."  Berkeley's  own  private  monopoly 
with  the  Indians  was  one  of  the  causes  that  led  to  the 
"rebellion."  The  monopoly  of  his  successor,  Cul- 
peper,  bore,  still  more  heavily  on  the  people.  The 
falsifying  of  elections  by  the  sheriffs  against  a  free 
white  people  was  as  flagrant  as  that  of  our  own  day 
in  Southern  states  against  the  negroes. 

If  we  turn  to  the  North,  in  1686,  when  Sir  Edmund 
Andros  came  as  governor  to  New  England,  the  at- 
mosphere is  charged  with  the  same  distempers. 
The  rights  of  property  were  so  invaded,  according 
to  Increase  Mather,  that  no  man  could  call  any- 
thing his  own.  Danforth  wrote,  "  Our  condition  is 
little  inferior  to  absolute  slavery."  When  the  people 
pleaded  for  habeas  corpus  and  the  simple  rights  of 
Magna  Charta,  Andros  asked  with  a  gibe,  "  Do  you 
believe  Joe  and  Tom  may  tell  the  king  what  money 
he  may  have  ? "  His  secretary  complains  that  little 
money  is  to  be  got  out  of  the  country,  because  it  has 
been  squeezed  dry  by  those  who  preceded  Sir  Edmund. 
With  Dudley  censor  of  the  press,  the  general  court 


74  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

abolished,  the  assembling  of  a  town  meeting  made  an 
act  of  sedition,  it  is  certain  that  to  those  then  living, 
the  times  seemed  big  with  dangers. 

The  generation  following  this  period  brings  us 
well  into  the  eighteenth  century.  A  time  of  pros- 
perity culminates  about  1740.  Bancroft  speaks  of 
it  as  "  marked  by  the  unrivalled  prosperity  of  the 
colonies."  It  would  be  unfair  to  select  illustrations 
of  special  unrest  during  the  disturbance  of  the  colo- 
nies by  the  French  and  English  wars  that  immediately 
follow.  Before  these  confusions  had  passed,  the  tur- 
moil of  the  struggle  for  independence  had  already 
begun.  The  war  spaces  are  too  exceptional  to  offer 
fair  instances  of  comparative  unrest.  The  Revolu- 
tion of  1776  will  therefore  be  omitted. 

Of  the  ten  years  that  precede  the  Revolution  and 
the  ten  that  follow  the  peace  of  1783  one  may  speak 
with  confidence.  It  is  doubtful  if  in  recent  times  we 
have  felt  any  such  measure  of  anxiety. 

McMaster  writes  :  "  The  year  1786  in  all  the  states 
was  one  of  unusual  distress.  The  crops  had  indeed 
been  good.  In  many  places  the  yield  had  been  great. 
Yet  the  farmers  murmured,  and  not  without  cause, 
that  their  wheat  and  their  corn  were  of  no  more  use 
to  them  than  so  many  bushels  of  stones,  that  produce 
rotted  on  their  hands.  That  while  their  barns  were 
overflowing,  their  pockets  were  empty.  That  when 
they  wanted  clothes  for  their  families,  they  were  com- 
pelled to  run  from  village  to  village  to  find  a  cobbler 
who  would  take  wheat  for  shoes,  and  a  trader  who 
would  give  everlasting  in  exchange  for  pumpkins. 
Money  became  scarcer  and  scarcer  every  week.  In 
the  great  towns  the  lack  of  it  was  severely  felt.  But 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  75 

in  the  country  places  it  was  with  difficulty  that  a  few 
pistareens  and  coppers  could  be  scraped  together 
toward  paying  the  state's  quota  of  the  interest  on  the 
national  debt. 

"A  few  summed  up  their  troubles  in  a  general 
way,  and  declared  the  times  were  hard.  Others 
protested  that  the  times  were  well  enough,  but  the 
people  were  grown  extravagant  and  luxurious.  For 
this,  it  was  said,  the  merchants  were  to  blame. 
There  were  too  many  merchants.  There  were  too 
many  attorneys.  Money  was  scarce.  Money  was 
plenty.  Trade  was  languishing.  Agriculture  was 
fallen  into  decay.  Manufactures  should  be  encour- 
aged. Paper  should  be  put  out. 

"  One  shrewd  observer  complained  that  his  country- 
men had  fallen  away  sadly  from  those  simple  tastes 
which  were  the  life-blood  of  republics.  It  was  dis- 
tressing to  see  a  thrifty  farmer  shaking  his  head  and 
muttering  that  taxes  were  ruining  him  at  the  very 
moment  his  three  daughters,  who  would  have  been 
much  better  employed  at  the  spinning-wheel,  were 
being  taught  to  caper  by  a  French  dancing  master. 
It  was  pitiable  to  see  a  great  lazy,  lounging,  lubberly 
fellow  sitting  days  and  nights  in  a  tippling  house, 
working  perhaps  two  days  in  a  week,  receiving 
double  the  wages  he  really  earned,  spending  the  rest 
of  his  time  in  riot  and  debauch,  and,  when  the  tax- 
collector  came  round,  complaining  of  the  hardness  of 
the  times  and  the  want  of  a  circulating  medium.  Go 
into  any  coffee-house  of  an  evening,  and  you  were 
sure  to  overhear  some  fellow  exclaiming,  "  Such 
times !  no  money  to  be  had  !  taxes  high  !  no  business 
doing !  we  shall  all  be  broken  men."  l 

1  "History  of  the  United  States,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  180. 


76  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Another  form  of  discontent,  that  which  appears  in 
times  of  recognized  prosperity,  asserts  itself  early  in 
Jefferson's  administration  at  the  opening  of  the  cen- 
tury, with  an  enduring  venom  and  vindictiveness  that 
is  difficult  in  these  days  to  understand.  In  the  last 
letter  that  Hamilton  ever  wrote,  are  words  that  tell 
what  it  was  that  filled  the  respectability  of  the  time 
with  a  kind  of  panic  —  "  our  real  disease,  which  is 
democracy." 

The  analogy  of  this  period  with  our  own  has  many 
startling  points  of  likeness  if  the  analogy  is  not  over- 
pressed.  Professor  Henry  Adams  says  that  men 
with  cool  heads  like  Rufus  King  and  Hamilton,  men 
like  Judge  Tracy,  Cabot,  Pickering,  Ames,  and  Gris- 
wold,  were  tormented  with  a  sense  of  coming  crisis 
which  "  overhung  these  wise  and  virtuous  men  like 
the  gloom  of  death."  "  Scores  of  clergymen  in  the 
pulpit,  numberless  politicians  in  Congress,  had  made 
no  other  use  of  their  leisure  than  to  point  out,  step  by 
step,  every  succeeding  stage  of  the  coming  decline. 
The  catastrophe  was  no  longer  far  away,  it  was  actu- 
ally about  them,  they  touched  and  felt  it  at  every 
moment  of  their  lives.  Society  held  together  merely 
because  it  knew  not  what  else  to  do." 1 

At  present  the  fear  has  frequent  expression  that 
a  victory  of  the  democratic  party  would  be  followed 
by  attacks  upon  the  higher  courts.  A  century  ago 
this  anxiety  was  far  keener  than  it  now  is.  The 
democratic  attack  upon  the  courts  in  Jefferson's  day 
as  "  creatures  of  the  aristocrats,"  as  "  corrupt "  and 
"irresponsible  to  the  people,"  surpasses  in  unquali- 
fied virulence  anything  that  Mr.  Debs  has  ever  ut- 
1  "  History  of  the  United  States,"  Vol.  VII.,  p.  68. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  77 

tered.  Judge  Chase  of  the  Supreme  Bench  looked 
upon  these  animosities  against  the  judiciary  as  the 
most  threatening  event  in  our  history.  Property,  he 
thought,  would  soon  be  without  defence,  and  personal 
liberty  pass  away  before  the  reign  of  the  mob.  In 
Baltimore,  in  1803,  he  said  :  — 

"The  independence  of  the  national  judiciary  is 
now  shaken  to  its  foundations.  Our  republican  Con- 
stitution will  sink  into  a  mobocracy  —  the  worst  of 
all  possible  governments.  .  .  .  The  modern  doctrines 
of  our  late  reformers,  that  all  men,  in  a  state  of 
society,  are  entitled  to  enjoy  equal  liberty  and  equal 
rights,  have  brought  this  mischief  upon  us;  and  I 
fear  it  will  rapidly  progress  until  peace  and  order,  free- 
dom and  property,  shall  be  destroyed." l 

In  the  eyes  of  Josiah  Quincy,  the  strongest  repre- 
sentative in  Congress  from  Massachusetts,  "  Jefferson 
was  a  transparent  fraud,  his  followers  were  dupes  or 
ruffians,  and  the  nation  was  hastening  to  a  fatal 
crisis."2 

When  he  arrived  in  Washington,  Mr.  Quincy  tells 
us  that  his  abhorrence  of  Jefferson  was  such  that  he 
would  not  even  accept  the  invitation  that  came  to 
him  to  dine  at  the  White  House.  "  I  regarded  him 
as  a  snake  in  the  grass,  the  more  dangerous  for  the 
oily,  wily  language  with  which  he  lubricated  his 
victims  and  applied  his  venom."  3 

It  is  difficult  to  point  out  a  single  menace  to  our 
political  or  industrial  life  that  has  not  been  an  object 
of  dismay  and  pessimistic  solicitude  throughout  our 

1  Adams,  "  History  of  the   United  States,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  149. 

2  Vol.  IV.,  p.  422. 

*  "  Life  of  Josiah  Quincy,"  by  Edmund  Quincy,  p.  88. 


78  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

earlier  history.  It  is,  for  instance,  widely  believed 
at  present  that  the  rage  for  speculation,  stimulated 
by  the  growth  of  trusts,  carries  with  it  dangers  that 
are  new  and  peculiar  in  their  gravity.  There  is  much 
truth  in  this,  but  the  dangers  of  speculation  are  not 
new.  The  volume  of  business  has  now  reached  such 
magnitude,  it  has  become  so  concentrated,  and  its 
manipulations  on  the  market  are  so  advertised,  that 
the  game  is  visible  to  every  eye.  In  the  earlier  times 
there  was  no  such  record,  but  speculation  in  its  most 
questionable  sense  appears  to  have  seized  about  every 
chance  that  offered  in  those  days. 

Large  portions  of  charitable,  religious,  and  educa- 
tional funds  were  formerly  raised  by  gambling  in 
lotteries.  Is  it  likely  that  an  age  which  gave  such 
sanction  to  this  "race  hunger"  should  be  less  apt 
than  we  of  the  present  to  display  the  gambling  in- 
stinct in  new  business  ventures  ?  We  know  what 
a  field  for  this  gaming  impulse  our  railroad  building 
has  offered ;  but  it  may  be  seen  just  as  vividly  a 
century  ago  in  the  making  of  common  toll-roads. 
After  the  success  of  the  "turnpike"  between  Lan- 
caster and  Philadelphia,  there  was  an  outbreak  of 
reckless  speculation  in  roads  and  canals  precisely 
similar  to  the  wild  work  in  railroad  enterprises  after 
our  war  of  1861.  The  industrial  betting  field  was 
much  narrower  and  stakes  were  smaller,  but  the 
people  were  as  eager  for  unearned  gains  then  as 
now.  The  Revolution  of  1776  was  followed  by  all 
the  gambling  which  new  ventures  at  that  time 
afforded.  Lotteries  to  build  roads  and  bridges  were 
common.  The  general  government  was  appealed 
to  on  every  hand  to  help  out  these  local  schemes. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  79 

Chartered  companies  to  deal  in  the  stocks  of  turn- 
pike corporations  were  started  early  in  the  century 
by  hundreds.  Even  Vermont  had  twenty-six  and 
New  Hampshire  twenty  in  1810.  A  year  later  New 
York  had  one  hundred  and  eighty.  The  crying  need 
of  that  time  was  cheaper  transportation.  To  haul 
a  single  ton  of  freight  from  Pittsburg  to  Philadelphia 
cost  $ 1 25.  What,  at  its  best,  was  the  spirit  of  enter- 
prise, and  at  its  worst  the  instinct  of  the  gamester, 
went  into  these  various  schemes.  There  was  as 
much  gambling  as  there  was  opportunity  to  gamble, 
and  ruin  followed  its  reckless  indulgence  then,  as  it 
follows  it  now. 

In  1896,  when  Mr.  Bryan  was  presidential  candi- 
date, the  majority  of  our  "  strong  and  safe  men " 
were  everywhere  telling  us  what  calamities  would 
troop  in  upon  us  if  he  were  elected.  The  hungry 
mob  that  would  follow  at  his  heels  were  sure  to  work 
ruin  in  every  business  interest  in  the  country. 

A  century  ago  when  Jefferson  became  president 
the  entire  conclave  of  scholars,  as  well  as  the  whole 
business  world  of  New  England,  was  horrified  at  the 
prospect  of  political  control  by  the  common  people. 
At  a  New  York  dinner,  Hamilton's  words  were, 
"  Your  people,  sir,  your  people  is  a  great  beast." 
The  most  brilliant  spokesman  of  New  England  re- 
spectability, Fisher  Ames,  said  in  1803  that  the  coun- 
try had  become  "  too  big  for  union,  too  sordid  for 
patriotism,  too  democratic  for  liberty."  The  gloom 
had  deepened  in  1808,  when  he  could  say:  — 

"  Our  days  are  made  heavy  with  the  pressure  of 
anxiety,  and  our  nights  restless  with  visions  of  hor- 
ror. We  listen  to  the  clank  of  chains,  and  overhear 


8O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

the  whispers  of  assassins.  We  mark  the  barbarous 
dissonance  of  mingled  rage  and  triumph  in  the  yell 
of  an  infuriated  mob;  we  see  the  dismal  glare  of 
their  burnings,  and  scent  the  loathsome  steam  of 
human  victims  offered  in  sacrifice."  Few  knew  New 
England  as  President  Dwight  of  Yale  College  knew 
it.  Yet  he  could  write,  "  We  have  a  country  gov- 
erned by  blockheads  and  knaves ;  .  .  .  can  the  im- 
agination paint  anything  more  dreadful  on  this  side 
hell?"1  Every  federal  newspaper  in  1803  had  this 
passage,  which  Professor  Adams  says  was  "  one  ex- 
ample among  a  thousand — neither  more  extravagant 
nor  more  treasonable  than  the  rest"  :  — 

"  A  democracy  is  scarcely  tolerable  at  any  period 
of  national  history.  Its  omens  are  always  sinister, 
and  its  powers  are  unpropitious.  It  is  on  its  trial 
here,  and  the  issue  will  be  civil  war,  desolation,  and 
anarchy.  No  wise  man  but  discerns  its  imperfections, 
no  good  man  but  shudders  at  its  miseries,  no  honest 
man  but  proclaims  its  fraud,  and  no  brave  man  but 
draws  his  sword  against  its  force.  The  institution 
of  a  scheme  of  policy  so  radically  contemptible  and 
vicious  is  a  memorable  example  of  what  the  villany 
of  some  men  can  devise,  the  folly  of  others  receive, 
and  both  establish  in  spite  of  reason,  reflection,  and 
sensation."2 

Even  the  saintly  Channing,  already  preaching  the 
new  hope  for  humanity,  and  breaking  with  religious 
tradition,  as  Jefferson  had  broken  with  political  tra- 
dition, showed  an  alarm  as  if  chaos  were  at  hand. 
In  the  Fast  Day  sermon  of  1810,  he  says:  "We  live 

1  Channing,  "United  States  of  America,"  p.  166. 
a  "  History  of  the  United  States,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  85. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  8 1 

in  times  which  have  no  parallel  in  past  ages ;  in 
times  when  the  human  character  has  almost  assumed 
a  new  form  ;  in  times  of  peculiar  calamity,  of  thick 
darkness,  and  almost  of  despair.  .  .  .  The  danger 
is  so  vast,  so  awful,  and  so  obvious,  that  the  blind- 
ness, the  indifference,  which  prevail,  argue  infatua- 
tion, and  give  room  for  apprehension  that  nothing 
can  rouse  us  to  those  efforts  by  which  alone  the 
danger  can  be  averted." 

If  the  opinion  of  twenty  of  the  wealthiest  and  best- 
known  of  the  citizens  of  New  England  had  been  asked 
at  any  time  during  the  two  administrations  of  Jeffer- 
son, and  probably  of  Madison  as  well,  it  is  safe  to 
say  that  eighteen  of  them  would  have  thought  the 
country  going  to  the  dogs. 

We  should  not  lend  a  serious  ear  to  any  contem- 
porary who  gave  expression  to  such  hysterical  fore- 
bodings as  these.  Whatever  the  peril  that  lurks  in 
the  trust,  in  plutocracy,  in  imperialism,  we  refuse  to 
go  to  the  length  of  sheer  consternation  that  these 
dignified  ancestors  honestly  felt. 

One  real  difference  between  the  misgivings  of  that 
day  and  those  of  our  own  concerns  religion.  The 
fears  to-day  are  business  fears.  In  1800  they  were 
also  religious.  The  only  heresy  that  is  now  dreaded  is 
economic.  Religious  heresy  is  no  longer  an  offence. 
No  one  objects  even  to  political  heresy  further  than 
it  implies  an  attack  on  some  cherished  form  of  prop- 
erty. In  1800,  the  anathema  lay  against  the  supposed 
infidel  and  the  Jacobin  democrat.  To-day  it  lies 
against  the  socialist,  the  aim  of  whose  politics  is 
radically  to  change  the  present  forms  of  property 
ownership. 


82  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

After  the  good  times  of  1815,  the  unrest  again 
changes  its  form.  Extreme  distress  and  consequent 
bitterness  are  at  hand,  which  we  cannot  match  in 
this  generation. 

The  obdurate  delusion  that  money  can  be  printed 
off  "  to  meet  the  wants  of  the  people  "  played  havoc 
then  as  it  does  still  among  us.  The  general  fury 
rose  against  the  banks  and  against  the  "  rich  who 
padded  themselves  about  with  luxury."  The  misery 
extended  "from  New  York  and  Pennsylvania  westward 
to  the  Mississippi  and  southward  to  Tennessee."  In 
Philadelphia,  where  9672  men  had  been  employed  in 
certain  industries  in  1816,  7500  had  been  discharged 
in  1819.  This  city  was  not  exceptional.  From  a 
country  town  27  properties  in  land  were  sold  at 
one  time  by  the  sheriff.  "All  over  the  North  the 
people  were  meeting,  complaining,  organizing,  and 
petitioning  Congress  and  their  state  legislatures." 
"The  larger  part  of  the  people,  even  with  the  ut- 
most economy,  could  hardly  obtain  the  very  neces- 
saries of  life ;  debts  were  unpaid,  creditors  dissatisfied, 
and  the  jails  full  of  honest  but  unfortunate  persons 
whose  wives  and  children  thereby  became  a  burden  on 
the  township."  After  describing  the  evils  in  Ken- 
tucky, McMaster  adds,  "  In  the  newly  made  state  of 
Missouri  the  condition  was,  if  possible,  worse."  In 
New  York  and  Philadelphia  there  was  a  series  of 
public  meetings  to  devise  means  to  cope  with  the 
dangers.  The  fourth  volume  of  McMaster  devotes 
an  entire  chapter  to  the  "  Pauperism  and  Crime  "  that 
followed  this  period.  "  Never,"  he  says,  "in  the  his- 
tory of  our  country  had  the  sufferings  of  the  depend- 
ent and  unfortunate  classes  been  so  forcibly  and 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  83 

persistently  brought  to  the  attention  of  the  public, 
for  never  before  had  so  many  worthy  citizens  been 
reduced  to  want. 

"  Hundreds  were  glad  to  work  for  37  and  even  25 
cents  a  day  in  winter,  who  in  spring  and  summer  could 
earn  62^  or  perhaps  87^  cents  by  toiling  fourteen  hours. 
On  the  canals  and  turnpikes  $15  a  month  and  found 
in  summer  and  one-third  that  sum  in  winter  were 
considered  good  pay.  In  truth,  it  was  not  uncommon 
during  the  winter  for  men  to  work  for  their  board. 
Nothing  but  perfect  health,  steady  work,  sobriety, 
the  strictest  economy,  and  the  help  of  his  wife  could 
enable  a  married  man  to  live  on  such  wages.  But 
the  earnings  of  women  were  lower  yet.  Many  trades 
and  occupations  now  open  to  them,  either  had  no 
existence  or  were  then  confined  to  men.  They  might 
bind  shoes,  sew  rags,  fold  and  stitch  books,  become 
spoolers,  or  make  coarse  shirts  and  duck  pantaloons 
at  8  or  10  cents  apiece.  Shirt-making  was  eagerly 
sought  after,  because  the  garments  could  be  made  in 
the  lodgings  of  the  seamstress,  who  was  commonly 
the  mother  of  a  little  family  and  often  a  widow. 
Yet  the  most  expert  could  not  finish  m'ore  than  nine 
shirts  a  week,  for  which  she  would  receive  72  or  90 
cents.  Fifty  cents  seems  to  have  been  the  average. 

"  To  the  desperate  poverty  produced  by  such  wages 
many  evils  were  attributed.  Intemperance  was  en- 
couraged, children  were  sent  into  the  streets  to  beg 
and  pilfer,  and  young  girls  were  driven  to  lives  of 
shame  to  an  extent  which,  but  for  the  report  of  the 
Magdalene  Society  in  New  York  and  the  action  of 
the  people  elsewhere,  would  be  incredible." 

Among  the  twelve  demands  made  before  1830,  the 


84  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

following  have  great  prominence :  "  the  right  to  the 
soil,"  "down  with  monopolies,"  "no  imprisonment 
for  debt,"  the  "  abolition  of  chattel  slavery  and  wage 
slavery." 

The  working  hours  per  day  in  one  Connecticut 
mill  were  fifteen,  and  this  was  no  exception.  One  in 
Paterson,  New  Jersey,  required  women  and  children 
to  be  at  work  at  half-past  four  in  the  morning. 
What  would  Lowell  weavers  say  to-day  if  they  were 
forced  by  their  employers  to  attend  church  on  pen- 
alty of  dismissal,  and  be  taxed,  moreover,  to  support 
religion  ? 

Once  more  let  the  comparison  be  made  between 
the  present  and  a  time  still  within  living  memory, 
roughly,  from  1830  to  1838.  The  fault-finding  with 
existing  institutions  was  wide  and  bitter.  At  that 
time,  moreover,  what  we  call  "  the  labor  question  " 
had  come  to  very  distinct  consciousness.  Discon- 
tent among  workingmen  led  to  the  formation  of 
a  political  party  in  New  York  as  early  as  1829.  In 
their  resolutions,  Henry  George  was  anticipated  in 
the  opening  paragraph,  "The  appropriation  of  the 
soil  of  the  state  to  private  and  exclusive  possession 
was  eminently  and  barbarously  unjust."  In  Art.  3, 
"  the  hereditary  transmission  of  wealth  "  is  considered 
as  one  of  the  causes  of  the  prevailing  poverty  and 
distress.  Or,  in  their  own  words,  "a  prime  source 
of  all  our  calamities."  They  insist  that  all  the  evils 
of  the  feudal  system  were  upon  them.  The  move- 
ment was  vigorous  enough  to  establish  newspapers 
in  at  least  four  states.  In  1832  a  convention  was 
held  in  Boston,  represented  by  delegates  from  six 
different  states.  The  "  evils  of  monopoly "  was  a 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  85 

topic  of  discussion,  and  among  the  lectures  organ- 
ized by  the  trade  unions  a  few  years  later,  "  Cor- 
porations "  is  on  the  list  of  their  subjects.  The 
contemporary  records  are  so  full  and  explicit  that 
one  who  has  been  taught  that  labor  troubles  have 
arisen,  for  the  most  part,  since  the  Civil  War,  has 
utterly  to  shift  his  perspective.  There  were  many 
and  bitter  strikes.  There  was  a  labor  party,  a  re- 
form party,  and  an  anti-monopolist  party.  There 
were  indictments  for  conspiracy  against  trade  unions. 
Two  thousand  men  were  "in  line  for  agitation"  in 
Boston  in  1834.  The  "scab"  was  then  a  terror  to 
the  trade  union  and  received,  not  infrequently,  very 
brutal  treatment.  In  the  same  year,  in  Massachu- 
setts, nearly  three  thousand  women  were  on  strike. 
The  still  earlier  agitation  for  ten  hours  was  accom- 
panied not  only  by  strikes,  but  by  such  lawlessness 
as  to  bring  out  the  militia.  Perhaps  the  most  dis- 
tinguished French  economist  of  his  time,  Chevalier, 
just  then  upon  a  visit  to  the  United  States,  expresses 
great  surprise  at  these  events. 

If  we  turn  from  the  general  to  the  more  special 
grounds  of  dissatisfaction,  it  is  difficult  to  select  any 
present  symbol  of  irritation  that  cannot  be  mated  in 
the  past.  In  Washington  before  a  private  committee 
of  the  Senate  I  listened  to  a  plea  of  trade-union  rep- 
resentatives that  the  "  injunction  "  be  prevented.  The 
chief  spokesman  said  it  was  "  new  in  our  history " 
and  "  had  come  with  the  recent  domination  of  great 
corporations."  Yet  the  literature  which  workingmen 
have  themselves  brought  out  shows  how  long  they 
have  been  harried  by  the  courts  in  time  of  strikes. 
The  common  English  law,  a  century  ago,  held  rigidly 


86  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

against  "  dangerous  labor  combinations  "  and  "  labor 
conspiracies,"  nor  was  there  the  slightest  hesitation 
in  its  enforcement.  This  was,  of  course,  not  the  "  in- 
junction "  as  we  know  it,  but  the  conspiracy  laws  were 
no  less  vexatious  to  organized  labor. 

The  Philadelphia  "  cordwainers  "  were  trained  in 
the  tactics  of  the  strike.  They  had  raised  their  wages 
until,  in  1805,  they  were  thought  to  be  ruinous  to  the 
employer.  The  strike  in  that  year  brought  them 
before  the  courts,  where  they  received  severe  sentence 
for  conspiracy.  The  boycott  was  common  in  these 
early  conflicts.  The  New  York  shoemakers  com- 
pelled the  journeyman  coming  to  the  city  to  join  their 
union.  If  he  refused  and  took  work  in  another  shop, 
a  strike  was  ordered  against  that  shop.  If  an  em- 
ployer had  an  apprentice  not  belonging  to  the  union 
(a  scab),  the  union  would  forthwith  order  a  strike.  An 
outbreak  with  every  symptom  of  the  "sympathetic 
strike"  in  1809  brought  the  union  up  for  conspiracy. 

To-day,  if  the  employer  fail,  the  laborer  has  a  lien 
upon  the  property  to  make  his  wages  secure.  The 
struggle  early  in  the  century  to  obtain  this  right  was 
ridiculed  as  an  attack  upon  social  order.  The  laborer 
might  be  paid  (not  weekly  as  now)  but  at  utterly  un- 
known intervals,  six  weeks  or  three  months,  and  even 
then  the  sort  of  money  he  received  was  so  often 
subject  to  discount,  as  to  constitute  a  very  bitter 
injustice. 

One's  first  impulse  is  to  question  the  gravity  of 
these  offences  against  labor,  but  every  accessible 
record  shows  how  real  they  were.  This  view  will  be 
strengthened  if  we  look  in  more  detail  at  a  single 
grievance.  It  was  not  confined  to  labor,  but  such 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  87 

multitudes  of  workingmen  felt  its  cruelties  that  we 
find  it  very  prominent  in  labor  programmes.  It  was 
imprisonment  for  debt. 

No  one  reports  these  facts  more  carefully  than 
Charles  Loring  Brace.1  He  says,  "As  late  as  1829, 
it  was  estimated  that  there  were  as  many  as  3000  of 
these  unfortunate  persons  confined  in  prisons  of  Mas- 
sachusetts ;  10,000  in  New  York ;  7000  in  Pennsyl- 
vania; 3000  in  Maryland;  and  a  like  proportion  in 
other  states.  In  the  Philadelphia  prisons  of  that 
year  there  were  imprisoned  for  debts  of  less  than  $i, 
32  persons ;  and  in  thirty  prisons  of  the  state,  595 
persons  were  imprisoned  for  debts  of  between  $i  and 
$5.  Many  of  these  were  honest  debtors,  who  had 
been  unable  to  pay,  solely  through  misfortune.  The 
proportion.of  debtors  to  other  prisoners  was  as  5  to  i." 

The  Report  of  the  Boston  Prison  Discipline  Soci- 
ety, page  388,  says :  "  We  have  known  of  a  respect- 
able mechanic  imprisoned  for  a  debt  of  five  dollars, 
contracted  by  his  family  at  a  grocer's  while  he  was 
very  ill ;  he  was  sent  to  jail,  and  he  was  not  only 
without  a  shilling,  but  his  family  was  without  bread, 
because  he  was  not  able  to  work."  The  keeper  of 
the  debtors'  department  of  the  Philadelphia  prison 
reported,  in  1828,  1085  debtors  imprisoned;  their 
debt  amounting  to  $25,409,  their  expense  to  the  com- 
munity, $362,076 ;  the  amount  of  the  debt  recovered 
in  jail  was  $295.  In  1831  the  Gazette  of  that  city 
reported  forty  debtors  imprisoned  for  debt  amounting 
to  $23.40.  One  man  was  confined  thirty  days  for  a 
debt  of  72  cents ;  another,  two  days  for  2  cents ; 
another,  thirty-two  days  for  2  cents ;  seven  were  con- 

1 "  First  Century  of  the  Republic,"  p.  458. 


88  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

fined  172  days  for  $2.84,  and  the  only  debt  recovered 
was  one  of  25  cents. 

This  is  the  period  of  which  McMaster  writes, 
"  Never  in  the  history  of  our  country  had  the  suffer- 
ings of  the  dependent  and  unfortunate  classes  been 
so  forcibly  and  persistently  brought  to  the  attention 
of  the  public,  for  never  before  had  so  many  worthy 
citizens  been  reduced  to  want."  l  Thus  it  is  evident 
that  so  far  as  reasons  for  discontent  are  concerned, 
labor  in  the  good  old  times  suffered  many  an  ill  that 
we  should  not  for  a  moment  tolerate. 

The  reader,  impatient  of  this  dull  rehearsal,  has 
already  asked  what  good  turn  can  be  served  by 
lingering  among  these  old-time  ailments.  These 
glimpses  of  evil  and  disturbed  days  among  our 
ancestors  do  not  lighten  a  single  burden  under  which 
the  present  suffers.  No  report  of  ancient  ills  can 
lessen  our  own  aches. 

Historical  retrospect  does  for  us,  nevertheless,  one 
inestimable  service.  It  helps  us  to  see  the  facts  of 
social  growth  and  order  in  some  due  relation  and 
perspective.  To  keep  this  perspective  is  the  hardest 
test  to  which  the  student  has  to  submit.  Even  a 
little  history  may  give  sounder  judgments  upon  the 
large  whole  of  our  industrial  and  social  existence. 
To  forget  or  to  ignore  this  past,  to  concentrate 
violent  attention  upon  the  disturbance  of  to-day,  is 
not  to  see  things  socially  at  all.  I  have  heard  wittier 
and  less  labored  definitions  of  a  crank,  but  never  a 

1  Among  the  best  sources  of  trustworthy  information  are  the  files 
of  the  United  States  Gazette  during  this  period.  In  the  Congressional 
Library  at  Washington  may  be  seen  under  glass  several  examples  of 
"  posters  "  showing  the  political  efforts  of  the  workingmen. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  89 

truer  one  than  this,  "A  man  who  sees  one  fact  so 
vividly  that  he  is  blind  to  all  the  other  facts  which 
alone  can  explain  the  one  he  sees."  Even  criticism 
has  its  responsibilities.  It  should  select  its  object 
with  some  degree  of  discrimination  and  deal  with  it 
in  its  relation  to  other  facts  of  which  it  may  be  a 
part.  The  frenzy  of  miscellaneous  abuse  is  perhaps 
the  cardinal  vice  of  a  whole  mass  of  emotional 
utterance  and  literature  upon  the  social  question. 
There  is  no  healing  for  these  distempers  of  excessive 
statement  like  that  which  historic  experience  affords. 

II 

In  endeavoring  to  compare  the  spirit  and  grounds 
of  complaint  in  different  eras,  we  are  met  by  one 
difficulty  that  should  not  pass  unnoticed.  The  com- 
mon people  in  earlier  times  had  no  easy  way  to 
popularize  their  sense  of  injustice.  A  Roman  strike 
was  followed  by  hanging  six  thousand  strikers  be. 
tween  Rome  and  Capua.  The  fact  was  chronicled 
as  we  should  chronicle  an  unusual  frost,  but  the 
plebeian  multitude  had  no  means  to  stir  the  whole 
public  opinion  in  its  favor ;  to  get  its  wrongs  talked 
about,  much  less  acted  upon.  The  avenues  for  the 
voicing  of  discontent  have  multiplied  with  popular 
education  to  a  degree  so  extraordinary  that  we  may 
now  easily  be  deceived  both  as  to  its  nature  and 
extent.  In  a  commercial  age  (if  all  have  been  taught 
to  read)  the  thing  that  pays  spreads.  The  scale  on 
which  social  fault-finding  and  restlessness  could  be 
made  to  pay  good  dividends  was  not  dreamed  of  by 
our  ancestors.  This  art  is  perfected  in  the  modern 
press.  It  has  been  said,  "  Blessed  are  the  people 


90  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

whose  records  are  dull."  Yes,  but  such  records  are 
not  commercially  profitable.  Peace  and  contentment 
have  no  dramatic  quality.  It  pays  to  sound  the 
tragic,  the  morbid,  the  alarming  note,  because  interest 
and  curiosity  are  stirred. 

No  sign  is  better  than  the  cry  of  the  newsboy  upon 
the  street.  He  does  not  call  out,  "  Most  excellent 
health  through  all  the  community  !  "  "  Not  a  divorce 
for  the  entire  month  !  "  "  No  accident  or  scandal 
since  the  last  edition ! "  This  would  be  good  news, 
but  he  knows  his  customer.  He  knows  that  every- 
day happiness,  the  common  welfare,  and  the  dulness 
of  good  behavior  do  not  sell  his  papers.  The  press 
has  also  learned  its  lesson.  It  has  learned  that  our 
fault-findings  and  our  agitations  may  be  turned  to  a 
money  profit.  "  If  I  can  find  fault  enough  and  state 
it  in  the  right  phrases,  no  papers  are  left  on  my 
hands,"  is  a  saying  reported  from  one  of  the  most 
successful  American  journalists.  The  French  press 
has  come  to  be,  in  this  respect,  as  mischievous  as 
our  own  worst  journals.  Some  of  the  most  popular 
of  the  Paris  sheets  have  brought  this  art  of  exploiting 
social  dangers  and  dissatisfactions  to  the  point  of 
last  refinement.  An  editorial  writer  in  London,  well 
known  in  this  country,  told  me  that  the  paying 
element  in  first-rate  alarmist  writing  had  at  last 
come  to  be  understood  in  England.  "The  young 
fellow's  fortune  is  made,"  he  said,  "who  learns  the 
trick  of  phrasing  criticism  against  the  present  social 
order."  If  the  people  of  any  past  century  had 
possessed  our  machinery  for  telling  and  spreading 
their  fears,  their  gossip,  their  corruptions,  their 
tragedies,  they  would  appear  to  us  like  a  people  of 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  91 

whom  we  had  never  heard.  This  new  facility  for 
the  utterance  of  our  complaints  becomes  also  a  cause 
of  the  evil.  To  insist  loudly  and  incessantly  that 
things  are  ill,  is  to  help  make  them  so,  although 
there  is  some  hope  that  the  sheer  din  of  the  caviller 
may  tend  at  last  to  beget  insensibility  and  indiffer- 
ence, as  excessive  advertising  may  sometime  defeat 
itself  by  its  dreary  universality.  We  shall  learn 
after  a  while  that  there  is  no  relation  between  the 
excellence  of  forty  different  kinds  of  shoes  or  soap 
and  the  hideous  disfigurement  of  pleasant  landscapes. 
Francis  Walker  was  wont  to  make  much  of  the 
encouraging  influences  upon  the  mind  of  the  laborer 
of  open  and  hopeful  chances  of  work.  As  long  as  it 
could  be  said,  "I  can  go  either  to  a  factory  or  take 
up  a  homestead  from  the  government  at  a  nominal 
price,"  the' mere  alternative  gave  a  sense  of  freedom 
and  independence,  as  well  as  a  tendency  to  strengthen 
wages.  Now  that  the  public  domain  has  been  dis- 
posed of,  this  special  avenue  of  possible  chances  is 
shut.  For  the  first  time  in  our  history,  the  popula- 
tion turns  back  upon  itself.  Who  would  dare  to 
stand  before  an  audience  of  workingmen  and  give 
them  to-day  Horace  Greeley's  advice,  "Go  West"  ? 
It  would  be  met  with  shouts  of  derision.  This  change 
has  already  become  a  very  vital  part  of  our  labor 
problems.  It  has  made  large  sections  of  the  less 
skilled  among  the  workingmen  honestly  feel  that  it 
is  no  longer  possible  for  them  to  get  beyond  utter 
dependence  upon  the  employer.  Until  very  recent 
times  all  were  encouraged  to  believe  that  they  could 
become  independent  as  employer  or  as  capitalist.  This 
had  so  substantial  a  basis  of  truth,  that  it  gave  rise  to 


92  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

a  kind  of  religion  in  which  the  saving  practical  virtue 
was  thrift,  and  the  ideal,  a  fat  bank  account  with  its 
heaven  of  "independence."  Barring  skill  and  un- 
usual enterprise,  the  feeling  has  deepened  and 
widened  among  workingmen  that  these  fine  hopes 
have  so  sadly  dwindled  that  they  exist  as  mere  lottery 
chances.  One  may  put  this  to  accurate  test  in  many 
of  our  industries.  In  my  own  city  the  conductors 
and  motormen  upon  the  trolley  cars  are  carefully 
selected  and  well  paid,  but  the  question  put  to  more 
than  forty  of  them,  "  Is  there  any  chance  in  your 
position  of  getting  on  very  much  ? "  elicits  usually 
only  good-natured  surprise  that  such  a  question  can 
be  asked.  There  is  rather  the  dogged  feeling  that  it 
must  be  made  the  best  of.  One  said  to  me,  "  I  am 
thankful  to  get  this ;  if  I  dropped  out,  a  hundred  men 
would  jump  at  my  chance  before  supper.  All  I  hope 
for  is  to  keep  this  job  twelve  years  at  most,  at  the 
end  of  which  I  shall  have  what  I  am  getting  to-day, 
two  dollars  and  a  quarter."  I  asked  him  if  he  were 
married.  "  Yes,  and  I  have  three  children,  but  I 
have  no  business  to  have  them.  With  city  rents  and 
market  prices  about  Boston,  I  can  just  keep  even. 
The  best  luck  I  expect  is  to  stick  here  till  I  am  forty, 
then  they  will  want  a  younger  man.  I  left  my  coun- 
try town  because  farming  only  keeps  you  alive. 
Down  here  I  just  keep  alive,  too,  but  it  ain't  a  grave- 
yard, as  it  is  up  there  in  the  hills."  Some  millions  of 
men  in  the  United  States  are  at  the  present  moment 
in  the  situation  of  that  motorman,  so  far  as  expecta- 
tions are  concerned.  For  commonplace  and  average 
abilities,  in  mill  and  factory,  the  cheering  promise  of 
getting  free  from  an  "  existence  wage  "  scarcely  ex- 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  93 

ists.  For  special  gifts,  the  prizes  never  were  so  high 
as  now.  For  ordinary  capacity  in  the  common  indus- 
tries the  old  hopes  are  lessened. 

A  clear  and  conservative  statement  of  this  evil  is 
given  by  President  Hadley :  "Certain  it  is  that  the 
prospect  of  becoming  capitalists  does  not  act  as  so 
powerful  a  motive  on  the  laborers  of  to-day  as  it  did 
on  those  of  a  generation  ago.  The  opportunities  to 
save  are  as  great  or  greater ;  but  the  amount  which 
has  to  be  saved  before  a  man  can  hope  to  become  his 
own  employer  has  increased  enormously.  When  a 
man  who  had  accumulated  a  thousand  dollars  could 
set  up  in  business  for  himself,  the  prospect  of  inde- 
pendence appealed  to  him  most  powerfully ;  when  he 
can  do  nothing  but  lend  it  to  some  richer  man,  the 
incentives  and  ambitions  connected  with  saving 
are  far  weaker  —  too  weak,  in  many  cases,  to  lead 
the  men  to  save  at  all,  except  through  the  medium  of 
a  friendly  society  or  trades  union.  We  thus  have  a 
separation  of  the  community  into  more  and  more 
rigidly  defined  groups,  different  in  industrial  condi- 
tion, distinct  in  ideals,  and  oftentimes  antagonistic  in 
their  ambitions  and  sympathies.  This  separation  of 
laborers  and  capitalists  into  distinct  classes  involves 
serious  dangers  to  society  as  a  whole."  1 

Not  wholly  different  from  this  is  another  source  of 
unrest.  It  has  long  been  known  that  well-paid  labor 
is  quicker  to  take  offence  than  labor  of  a  lower  grade. 
That  men  with  higher  wages  should  be  the  first  to 
strike,  has  vexed  many  an  employer  and  filled  many 
polite  persons  with  astonished  disgust.  It  is  neverthe- 
less what  the  race,  in  its  most  progressive  stages,  has 
1 "  Economics,"  p.  371. 


94  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

always  done.  Higher  earnings,  ampler  knowledge  and 
freedom,  go  with  new  ambitions  and  a  keener  sensi- 
tiveness about  all  hindrances  to  progress.  Every 
improvement,  every  step  in  the  enjoyment  of  new  com- 
forts which  leisure  and  better  pay  afford,  constitutes  a 
reason  for  new  efforts.  A  higher  standard  of  living 
once  gained,  becomes  of  itself  a  sentiment  so  respon- 
sive, that  any  act  or  event  which  seems  to  threaten 
that  standard  arouses  instant  alarm  and  hostility. 
The  force  of  this  is  not  seen  unless  we  realize  the 
rapidity  with  which  new  wants,  in  our  age  and  coun- 
try, are  formed.  The  higher  standard  of  comfort,  — 
food,  clothing,  housing,  leisure,  —  once  established, 
becomes  a  necessity  so  imperious,  that  men  will  put 
forth  their  whole  strength  to  maintain  it.  A  shrewd 
builder  of  workingmen's  houses  in  a  Massachusetts 
shoe  town  says,  "  I  don't  dare  to  put  up  a  house  now 
without  a  bathroom,  so  many  of  the  shoe  hands  have 
got  a  taste  of  it,  that  all  demand  it." 

We  know  personally,  or  by  observation  among  the 
well-to-do  citizens,  that  any  serious  lowering  of  in- 
come—  as,  for  example,  from  $5000  to  $3000  —  is 
looked  upon  as  a  disaster.  Do  people  of  ampler 
income  lack  imagination  that  they  fail  to  see  the 
bearings  of  this  fact  upon  the  threatened  income  of 
the  wage  earners  ?  A  study  has  been  made  of  an 
Eastern  town  in  which  more  than  four  thousand 
American  workmen  receive  a  wage  that  does  not 
average  $1.85.  What  must  it  mean  for  a  family  of 
five  persons  to  have  this  sum  cut  even  25  cents  a  day  ? 
The  worst  —  as  it  is  the  commonest  cut  of  all  —  is 
the  large  average  of  days  in  the  year  when  there  is 
no  work,  and  pay  stops  altogether.  The  simplest 


THE   SOCIAL  UNREST  95 

addition  of  cost  for  the  invariable  necessities  —  food, 
rent,  clothing  —  makes  clear  how  narrow  a  margin 
is  left.  I  choose  the  employees  in  this  town  because 
they  rank  distinctly  above  unskilled  labor,  and  have 
won  a  standard  of  life  from  which  every  loss  is 
dreaded,  because  the  expenditure  of  respectability  in 
their  group  is  endangered. 

Every  little  sign  of  respectability  which  the  higher 
wage  makes  possible — the  parlor  organ,  the  cheap  lace 
curtains,  the  beribboned  furniture,  the  gaudily  framed 
family  crayon  —  soon  becomes  the  basis  of  a  sentiment 
as  powerful  as  it  is  salutary.  Do  we  imagine  that 
their  symbols  of  respectability  mean  less  to  them 
than  to  the  fops  of  the  fashionable  quarter  ?  I  have 
known  a  man  grow  gray  with  trouble  in  five  years 
because  his  income  shrank  just  enough  to  force  him 
to  move  into  a  less  distinguished  part  of  the  town. 
He  still  had  every  possible  comfort,  but  could  not 
have  the  private  school,  the  doctor,  the  dentist  of  the 
elite  in  his  former  neighborhood.  Workingmen,  and 
more  especially  their  wives,  who  have  once  gained 
the  income  of  modest  comfort,  have  something  to 
lose,  upon  which  great  price  is  set,  and  therefore 
organize,  strike,  and  struggle,  often  in  most  regret- 
table ways,  to  maintain  that  standard.  The  fear  of 
losing  their  standard  acts  upon  them  precisely  as  it 
does  on  their  "betters."  Lowest  paid  labor  revolts 
less  frequently,  not  only  because  it  is  duller  and  more 
helpless,  but  because  the  sentiment  which  gathers  and 
strengthens  about  the  newly  won  luxuries  is  still  too 
feeble.  It  is  the  sense  of  insecurity,  lest  these  sym- 
bols of  getting  on  in  the  world  may  at  any  time  be 
lost,  that  is  at  present,  as  it  is  long  likely  to  re- 


96  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

main,  one  of  the  deepest  and  most  justifiable  sources 
of  discontent.  Nothing  is  so  habitually  ignored,  in 
attempts  to  understand  industrial  struggles,  as  the 
force  and  prevalence  of  this  sentiment. 

It  is  a  little  tedious  to  refer  to  general  education  as 
a  cause  of  discontent,  but  its  consequences  are  so 
momentous  that  its  omission  would  be  unwise.  Popu- 
lar education  and  the  spread  of  democratic  ideas  evi- 
dently introduce  influences  calculated  in  their  very 
nature  to  stimulate  the  feelings  out  of  which  unrest 
grows.  It  would  puzzle  one  to  conceive  a  more  fer- 
tile breeding-place  of  unsatisfied  desires  than  that 
which  present  educational  facilities  offer.  It  is  the 
essence  of  education  to  arouse  mental  activity,  with 
the  sure  result  that  thousand-fold  new  wants,  cravings, 
and  ambitions  are  quickened  into  life.  The  number 
and  importunity  of  these  wants  have  apparently  no 
limit,  while  upon  their  satisfaction  there  is  a  constant 
check.  The  basis  of  this  education  has  been  a  rising 
material  prosperity  to  the  same  end  of  awakening 
still  further  wants.  A  retired  Cape  Cod  captain  once 
gave  me  a  list  of  things  —  food,  clothing,  furniture, 
reading  matter,  etc.  —  which  entered  into  the  usual 
family  consumption  in  his  community  sixty  years  ago. 
These  were  compared  with  the  articles  in  present  use 
in  the  neighborhood.  The  difference  in  kind  and 
variety  of  things  enjoyed  in  the  two  periods  were,  as 
they  were  brought  together,  far  more  striking  than 
either  of  us  had  believed.  After  reflecting  upon  the 
contrast,  the  old  man  said :  "  Yes,  that's  the  trouble. 
My  father  wanted  fifteen  things.  He  didn't  get  'em 
all.  He  got  about  ten,  and  worried  considerable  be- 
cause he  didn't  get  the  other  five.  Now,  I  want  forty 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  97 

things,  and  I  get  thirty,  but  I  worry  more  about  the 
ten  I  can't  get  than  the  old  man  used  to  about  the 
five  he  couldn't  get."  Could  any  pedantry  of  lan- 
guage or  of  statistics  tell  more  truth  or  better  truth 
than  this  ?  The  sixty  years  had  brought  great 
changes  in  the  standard  of  life,  but  the  old  relation 
between  wants  and  their  satisfaction  remained. 
Though  in  the  coming  sixty  years  the  affluence  of 
wealth  multiply  our  material  prosperity  an  hundred- 
fold, is  it  to  be  expected  that  the  margin  of  un- 
quenched  desires  will  be  narrower?  Will  the, ratio  of 
cravings  which  we  cannot  appease  be  essentially 
diminished  ?  To  what  race  experience  could  one 
point  to  justify  this  expectation  ?  Unless  we  assume 
the  hope  of  an  education  profoundly  modified,  an 
education  the  supreme  purpose  of  which  shall  not  only 
be  to  sharpen  the  edge  of  intellectual  cunning,  but, 
at  least,  in  equal  degree,  to  strengthen  the  moral  and 
social  sympathies,  we  seem  likely  to  the  end  of  time  to 
be  whipped  on  by  a  multitude  of  wants  that  will  over- 
top every  means  to  gratify  them.1 

There  is  no  end  to  the  number  and  variety  of  illus- 
trations to  show  the  unrest  that  goes  hand  in  hand 
with  education  and  material  prosperity.  None  is 
more  familiar  than  the  higher  education  of  woman 
that  has  been  organized  on  so  generous  a  scale  dur- 
ing the  last  generation.  We  do  not  doubt  the  large 
advantage  it  brings  to  her  and  to  the  race.  It  has, 

1  I  have  heard  a  learned  Catholic  say  that  it  was  one  of  the  superi- 
orities of  his  religion  over  Protestantism  that  the  ratios  of  insanity  and 
suicide  are  so  much  lower  in  Catholic  communities.  He  traced  these 
ugly  phenomena  chiefly  "  to  the  discontent  which  follows  a  restless 
and  successful  materialism." 


98  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

however,  helped  create  a  restlessness  which  newly 
awakened  faculty  and  enlarged  opportunity  inevita- 
bly bring  with  them.  There  is  already  a  literature  of 
the  subject.  For  a  dozen  years  English  and  American 
Reviews  have  reflected  these  perturbations  in  scores 
of  articles:  "The  Revolt  of  the  Daughters,"  "The 
Passing  of  the  Household  Drudge,"  "The  Unquiet 
Sex,"  "  The  Cry  of  the  Mothers,"  with  variations  in- 
numerable. During  this  time  we  note  two  influences 
working  together:  industrial  development  and  the 
higher  education,  both  of  which  act  to  enlarge 
woman's  opportunity.  It  is  claimed  that  twenty-five 
years  have  widened  woman's  avenues  for  earning  an 
independent  livelihood  from  some  hundreds  to  as 
many  thousands.  Industrial  and  intellectual  oppor- 
tunity alike  have  worked  greatly  for  her  economic 
independence.  We  have,  in  a  word,  in  so  brief  a 
period,  a  ratio  of  progress  of  which  previous  history 
has  no  hint.  The  feverish  agitations  of  the  "woman 
question"  have,  however,  been  a  very  part  of  this 
general  uplifting,  but  the  thousand  new  chances  to 
earn  a  livelihood,  the  thousand  girls'  schools  and 
scores  of  colleges,  have  only  intensified  the  claims 
which  woman  raises  for  a  larger  life.  The  "  woman 
question,"  with  all  its  restlessness,  is  a  natural  fruit 
of  the  new  occasions. 

Again,  we  think  of  the  Germans  as  the  most  thor- 
oughly educated  people.  Especially  since  the  period 
dominated  by  the  fateful  personality  of  Bismarck, 
Germany  stands  out  preeminent  for  what  is  generally 
connoted  by  the  word  "  progress."  There  is  the  high 
tide  of  race  vitality,  as  indicated  by  the  enormous 
annual  surplus  population.  The  rise  in  her  material 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  99 

standard  of  living  has  been  rapid  and  widespread. 
Her  commerce,  stimulated  by  the  most  efficient  com- 
mercial training  the  world  has  seen,  frightens  every 
European  rival  by  the  vigor  of  its  growth.  Yet  with 
the  flush  of  great  victory  still  warm  upon  her,  this 
nation,  if  we  may  believe  many  of  her  most  eminent 
writers,  was  never  more  lacking  in  contentment,  never 
more  ill  at  ease  than  now :  Von  Oettingen  specu- 
lating gloomily  upon  the  significance  of  increasing 
suicide,  rising  highest  at  the  very  points  where  edu- 
cation has  done  its  completest  work ;  Von  Treitschke, 
before  his  death,  telling  his  class  in  history,  that  he 
looked  with  growing  alarm  upon  the  signs  of  discon- 
tent among  the  masses ;  Paulsen  taking  the  strange 
phenomenon  for  granted,  as  if  not  open  to  dispute, 
and  trying  .to  account  with  much  scholarly  ingenuity 
for  the  causes  of  the  malady.1 

Just  before  his  retirement  the  chancellor,  Prince 
Hohenlohe,  used  these  words  before  the  Royal 
Academy  of  Science :  "  I  have  grown  old  in  the 
belief  of  the  constant  progress  of  humanity.  But 
within  recent  years  my  confidence  has  been  badly 
shaken.  The  indispensable  battle  of  life  has  of  late 
assumed  so  fierce  and  coarse  a  form  that  we  are 
reminded  of  the  wild  and  fantastic  tales  of  animal  life 
in  the  antediluvian  ages.  Instead  of  progress,  retro- 

1  Many  acute  references  to  these  pessimistic  humors  of  the  time  may 
be  found  in  Professor  Paulsen's  volume  "  Die  Ethik."  It  is  a  book 
which  is  likely  to  have  a  higher  value  to  later  generations  because 
it  mirrors  with  singular  vividness  the  average  educated  thought  of  the 
time  upon  a  great  variety  of  culture  subjects.  See,  for  example,  the 
passage,  page  116,  ending  with  the  words,  dass  Steigerung  der  Kultur 
nicht  nur  die  Gluckseligkeit  nicht  steigere,  sondern  vielmehr  Schmerz 
und  Enttauschung  vermehre. 


IOO  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

gression,  rather,  seems  to  mark  the  beginning  of  the 
twentieth  century." 

Both  illustrations  indicate  that  the  sense  of  ills  is 
not  confined  to  the  industrial  field  —  to  the  friction 
between  capital  and  labor.  In  every  phase  of  life 
where  the  "  strife  for  things  desired  "  goes  on,  the 
same  restless  antagonisms,  the  same  dissonance  of 
opinion  appear.  They  appear  among  the  different 
schools  of  literature,  in  politics,  in  art,  and  in  science. 
In  the  very  sphere  of  the  harmonies,  music,  the 
angry  assertion  of  discordant  judgments  (as  among 
Wagnerites  and  their  opponents)  will  easily  match 
the  worst  polemics  of  social  and  industrial  disputes. 
If  we  except  religion,  these  are  narrower  fields  than 
those  in  which  the  industrial  struggle  goes  on.  Yet 
the  factions  in  art,  in  literature,  in  science,  in  reli- 
gion, include  those  to  whom  civilization  and  culture 
have  brought  their  best  gifts.  We  should  have  ex- 
pected the  amenities  to  prevail  in  these  spheres,  but 
experience  shows  them  to  be  rent  by  the  same  uneasy 
spirit  which  animates  human  activity  as  a  whole.  It 
is  thus  a  point  gained  for  clearer  discussion  to  see 
that  it  is  all  the  unrest  of  human  life,  and  not  that  of 
some  partial  phase  of  it.  Of  religion,  too,  another 
word  should  be  added.1 

1  In  that  most  thoughtful  book,  "  The  Theology  of  Civilization," 
Introduction,  vi,  Charles  F.  Dole  says:  "There  is  seething  unrest; 
there  is  doubt  of  the  sanctions  of  religion;  there  is  a  sense  of  coming 
change;  there  is  suspicion  that  premises  and  foundations,  once 
unquestioned,  are  now  perhaps  undermined;  there  is  challenging 
of  existing  institutions  —  social,  economical,  ecclesiastical.  Are  the 
present  institutions  such  as  the  world  will  continue  to  find  use  for? 
There  is  dread  mingled  with  hope.  What  possible  revolutions  may 
not  impend,  setting  the  old  order  aside?  " 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  IOI 

One  cannot  omit  from  the  causes  of  unrest  the 
slow  decay  of  authority  in  religion.  Even  if  what  is 
deepest  in  the  religious  spirit  is,  as  many  hold,  un- 
abated in  its  strength,  the  element  of  religious 
authority  has  lost  much  of  its  power  over  men.  If 
this  loss  is  seen  as  a  part  of  other  influences  which 
accompany  it,  few  will  doubt  that  for  certain  tem- 
peraments, especially  in  the  Protestant  world,  this 
loss  has  brought  its  own  deep  disquietude.  This  is 
not  aside  from  the  social  question.  Its  literature 
is  filled  with  angry  or  sorrowful  complaints  that 
religion,  as  actually  embodied  in  the  church,  has 
been  systematically,  even  if  unconsciously,  used  to 
quiet  the  masses  and  reconcile  them  to  their  lot. 
One  of  the  most  honest  and  intelligent  labor  men 
I  have  ever  known,  told  me  that  as  long  as  he  really 
believed  what  he  understood  his  pastor  to  preach,  he 
was  fairly  content.  "  The  sermon,"  he  said,  "  always 
appeared  to  me  to  reconcile  things  I  couldn't  under- 
stand. Mysterious  religious  authority  was  always 
given  which  I  accepted.  When  I  talked  to  the  min- 
ister about  definite  cases  of  suffering  in  a  hard  strike, 
where  he  and  I  both  believed  the  men  were  not  to 
blame,  he  still  insisted  that  somehow  it  was  all  right, 
and  somewhere  in  the  future  it  would  be  set  straight. 
Now,  my  experience  has  taken  that  belief  out  of  me, 
or,  at  any  rate,  the  kind  of  authority  he  gives  for  it,  I 
cannot  any  longer  accept.  Nor  do  I  believe  the  Jesus 
he  talks  so  much  about  would  have  accepted  it  or  acted 
on  it  either.  The  successful  classes,  even  if  they  didn't 
know  it,  or  mean  it,  have  used  religion  and  heaven  to 
keep  the  peace  and  to  put  off  a  lot  of  troublesome 
duties.  When  I  found  this  out,  I  threw  it  all  over." 


102  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

That  individual  experience,  without  one  shade  of 
heightened  color,  stands  for  the  position  of  a  great 
multitude  of  the  more  intelligent  workingmen  in 
every  country.  It  is  clear  what  this  must  mean. 
The  dissatisfactions  that  were  felt,  while  religious 
authority  still  held  some  sway  over  them,  were 
silenced,  or  spent  in  vague  wonder  on  other  worldly 
speculations.  If  injustice  was  felt,  there  was  no 
thought  of  blaming  God.  "  Now,"  as  my  friend 
added,  "  when  the  ghosts  are  out  of  the  way,  we  put 
the  blame  where  it  belongs  —  upon  present  human 
society  and  upon  those  who  control  it."  These  feel- 
ings, however  poor  a  reason  they  can  give  for  them- 
selves, are  far  more  embarrassing  when  they  are 
vented  upon  the  actual  social  regime;  when  turned 
from  the  other  world  straight  upon  this.  The  decays 
of  faith  are,  of  course,  in  no  way  confined  to  a  class, 
nor  does  the  illustration  just  given  point  to  the  most 
serious  fact,  which  I  conceive  to  be  this  :  the  old 
authorities  are  being  abandoned  at  the  very  moment 
when  material  successes  and  sensuous  gratifications 
multiply  at  a  rate  compared  to  which  our  ethical 
advancement  seems  moving  at  the  snail's  pace. 

It  is  not  only  the  nature  of  education  to  create 
more  aspirations  than  can  be  realized ;  it  is  also  the 
nature  of  all  political  agitation.  That  men  are 
"politically  equal"  may  remain  long  a  harmless 
proposition ;  but  when  it  has  done  its  work,  when 
it  has  become  so  thoroughly  accepted  as  to  form  a 
common  assumption  of  thought  and  discussion,  new 
and  disturbing  questions  are  sure  to  be  asked.  It 
was  once  quite  an  amazing  absurdity  that  man  should 
ask  for  religious  equality,  yet  this  has  been  attained. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  103 

It  was  thought  by  the  wisest  of  men,  less  than  two 
centuries  ago,  just  as  preposterous  that  men  should 
make  claims  to  political  equality,  yet  this,  at  least 
theoretically,  has  been  won.  Is  it  probable  that  the 
questioning  will  end  here  ? 

Will  a  race,  spurred  on  by  an  ever  ampler  and 
more  insistent  cultivation  of  its  faculties,  halt,  in  its 
inquiries  about  equality,  on  the  confines  of  religion 
or  of  politics  ? 

With  the  plain  fact  of  economic  inequality  of  very 
extreme  character  staring  us  in  the  face,  the  question 
is  being  raised  here,  too.  It  has  grown  clear  that 
when  a  certain  stage  of  discipline  and  civilization  has 
been  reached,  religious  and  political  inequalities  are 
felt  to  be  socially  mischievous.  Nothing  will  hinder 
the  raising  of  the  next  query :  Is  the  present  indus- 
trial inequality  worthy  of  more  respect  than  the  other 
inequalities  ?  Philosophers  have  speculated  about 
this  from  early  times.  It  is  a  different  matter  when 
the  masses  learn  to  raise  the  question.  The  analogy 
here,  it  must  be  admitted,  is  risky.  A  wholly  differ- 
ent order  of  questions  is  raised  on  the  industrial  field. 
The  reasons  for  our  material  inequalities  are  at  so 
many  points  different  from  the  inequalities  of  the 
religious  or  political  field  that  the  comparison  may 
easily  mislead  us.  These  are,  however,  distinctions 
for  which  the  general  judgment  may  have  scant 
regard.  It  is  so  easy  to  prove  that  anything  like  a 
literal  economic  equality  is  fatuous,  or,  at  least,  that 
we  stand  in  no  practical  relation  to  such  a  result,  that 
it  may  seem  safely  beyond  range  of  sober  discussion. 
Careful  observation  shows,  however,  that  it  is  not  a 
literal  industrial  equality  that  is  meant  by  those  who 


104  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

have  opened  and  popularized  this  speculation.  A 
growing  number  of  writers,  and  among  them  econo- 
mists of  the  first  rank,  do  not  hesitate  to  put  the  aim 
toward  far  greater  economic  equality  on  a  par  with 
the  two  other  equalities.  Nor  is  the  aim  confined  any 
longer  to  books. 

A  distinguished  Australian  judge,  the  late  Sir 
William  Windeyer,  said  while  in  this  country :  "  We 
have  not  learned  to  manage  our  social  legislation 
without  most  regrettable  blunders.  Our  state  rail- 
ways have  got  into  politics,  there  has  been  jobbery, 
and  the  application  of  the  best  inventions  has  been 
kept  back  by  selfish  interests.  We  have  lived  glut- 
tonously on  borrowed  money,  and  piled  up  large  city 
debts.  All  this  is  true,  but  it  is  not  all  the  truth.  It 
all  came  so  fast  that  it  ran  away  with  us.  We  are 
beginning  to  face  the  situation,  and  shall  eventually 
learn  our  lesson.  Meantime,  in  spite  of  our  blunder- 
ing, nothing  would  induce  the  Australian  people  to 
turn  back.  We  have  accepted  the  democratic  prin- 
ciple, and  shall  learn  in  good  time  to  apply  it  indus- 
trially to  our  monopolies,  as  we  have  learned  to  apply 
it  generally  to  politics." 

Much  of  this  legislation  shows  openly  and  directly 
that  it  aims  to  make  the  massing  of  great  private  for- 
tunes increasingly  difficult.  One  of  the  foremost  of 
New  Zealand  legislators,  Hon.  W.  P.  Reeves,  states 
the  purpose  with  great  boldness,  "  It  is  the  uncon- 
cealed object  of  our  social  legislation  to  make  democ- 
racy consistent  and  possible  —  to  create  conditions 
out  of  which  such  threatening  extremes  of  wealth- 
ownership  cannot  grow."  These  attempts  may  fail. 
Capital  may  take  wings,  and  the  daring  of  individual 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST  1 05 

enterprise  may  be  dulled  to  the  general  loss ;  but  a 
multitude  of  people  are  so  incredulous  about  this  that 
legislators  will  be  compelled  to  far  wider  experiment- 
ing in  the  same  general  direction. 

Thus,  in  the  world  of  comparative  politics,  this 
clearly  conceived  ideal  of  giving  labor  a  new  chance, 
of  using  the  powers  of  government  expressly  to  this 
end,  has  been  openly  accepted.  It  is  conspicuously 
under  trial.  Its  story  occupies  increasing  space  in 
the  laborer's  thought.  Though  failure  follow  in  its 
track,  the  heart  of  this  great  purpose  is  a  noble  one : 
to  use  the  full  strength  of  public  authority  to  raise 
the  standard  of  comfort,  of  leisure,  and  of  culture 
among  those  classes  that  have  known  far  too  little  of 
either.  As  this  endeavor  becomes  known,  it  raises 
hopes  for  the  future  and  discontent  with  actual  limi- 
tations. Every  ideal  passion  among  the  laboring  sec- 
tions now  centres  about  this  aspiration  to  raise  this 
life  standard  and  to  preserve  it  against  all  adversaries. 

Thus  far  the  actual  proofs  that  popular  govern- 
ment can  perform  these  prodigies  in  well-doing  are 
meagre  enough,  but  the  effort  will  be  made,  and  it 
will  come  through  the  avenues  of  politics. 

It  is  thus  the  sum  of  these  causes  of  unrest,  reach- 
ing new  intensity  in  each  succeeding  period  of  busi- 
ness depression,  and  assuming  a  more  consciously 
political  character,  that  distinguishes  the  restlessness 
of  our  age. 

It  is  here  that  we  reach  such  important  difference 
as  there  is  between  our  unrest  and  that  of  the  past. 
The  forces  of  discontent  can  now  show  themselves  in 
politics.  Even  if  our  dissatisfactions  are  no  greater 
than  in  other  days ;  even  if  they  are  fewer,  they  have 


IO6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

found  a  more  effective  medium  of  expression.  It  is 
not  only  discontent  plus  education ;  not  only  discon- 
tent plus  the  press  to  voice  it ;  it  is  discontent  plus 
the  vote.  The  spirit  of  revolt  can  now  make  record 
of  itself  in  political  activity.  It  can  be  turned  to  ac- 
count by  every  demagogue.  It  can  create  legislation 
and  direct  the  machinery  of  government.  The  word 
"  socialism  "  stands  for  the  new  defiance.  It  embodies 
the  unrest  and  the  disapproval  of  commercial  society 
as  it  now  exists. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  AND  ITS  ECONOMIC  SIGNIFICANCE 

ONE  sees  social  questions  innumerable,  but  what  is 
meant  by  "the  social  question,"  as  if  a  single  issue 
dominated  all  others ;  as  if  society  were  afflicted  with 
a  single  ailment  ?  Statesmen  and  economists  of  first 
eminence  can  be  quoted  as  speaking  and  writing 
upon-  "  the  question  "  as  if  so  simple  a  term  covered 
the  facts.  I  have  seen  in  a  private  library  nearly  one 
hundred  different  volumes  and  pamphlets  with  the 
title  "  The  Social  Question,"  or  titles  strictly  synony- 
mous, implying  that  some  one  all-inclusive  issue  had 
arisen  to  vex  the  present  generation. 

It  is  first  to  be  noted  that  those  who  speak  of 
"the  social  question"  differ  widely  and  often  radi- 
cally as  to  what  the  question  is.  There  is  a  social 
question  to  the  ultra-individualist,  Auberon  Herbert, 
but  it  has  scarcely  a  single  point  in  common  with  the 
social  question  of  that  man  of  ponderous  learning,  Dr. 
Schaeffle.  Henry  George  had  his  question,  but  it  dif- 
fered fundamentally  in  two  out  of  the  three  chief 
points  from  the  question  of  Sidney  Webb  and  John 
Burns.  There  is  not  one  issue,  nor  the  same  issue, 
for  the  single  taxer  and  for  the  socialist.  It  is  an 
error  well-nigh  humorous  to  suppose  that  even  social- 
ists have  anything  like  a  single  issue.  Compare  the 
Marx  tradition  with  that  of  the  English  Fabians,  or 

107 


108  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

with  that  of  the  able  collectivist  leaders  of  the  Belgian 
Parliament.  Both  in  theory  and  in  practical  remedies 
are  differences  not  only  of  degree,  but  of  kind.  Even 
a  little  study  of  the  social  literature  shows  that  in 
doctrine  and  in  practice  the  writers  are  dealing  with 
a  great  variety  of  conflicting  issues.  I  have  made 
from  this  literature,  in  the  last  fifteen  years,  a  list  of 
eighty-four  "remedies"  for  the  social  question,  i.e. 
remedies  that  were  believed  to  be  sovereign.  The 
causes  of  our  ills,  in  these  writings,  were  fewer  than 
the  remedies,  but  the  "  root  evils  "  were  so  many  and 
so  various,  that  to  speak  of  a  question  or  the  question 
without  explanation  is  open  to  confusion.  Is  it 
"  over-production  "  or  "  underconsumption  "  ?  Is  it 
"  adherence  to  the  gold  standard  "  or  is  it  the  "  silver 
craze  "  ?  Is  it  "  monopolies  "  or  "  speculation  "  or 
"  extravagance  "  or  "  over-saving  "  ?  Is  it  the  "  three 
rents  "  or  the  "  private  ownership  of  land  "  ?  These 
are  a  few  of  the  most  commonly  assigned  causes  of 
our  troubles  that  are  most  nearly  akin.  But  who 
could  create  out  of  them  a  single  issue  ?  Especially 
if  remedies  are  introduced,  we  face  many  questions, 
and  not  one  question.  If  the  followers  of  Henry 
George  are  right  in  holding  that  the  present  forms  of 
private  land  ownership  constitute  the  supreme  evil, 
they  are  justified  in  insisting  upon  "  the  question " 
and  upon  "the  remedy."  The  socialist  who  adds  to 
the  George  evil  the  private  control  of  the  "  means  of 
production "  raises  new  complications  for  which  a 
simple  formula  is  more  difficult.  If  the  socialist  has 
become  confessedly  "  opportunist,"  the  simple  for- 
mula, for  theory  and  its  application,  is  still  more 
inadequate.  Shall  the  term  "  social  question,"  then,  be 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  109 

left  to  the  single  taxer  or  to  the  socialist  of  the  ultra- 
doctrinaire  type  ? 

It  would  be  over-nice  to  put  these  limits  upon  a 
phrase  that  has  so  passed  into  common  thought  and 
discussion :  it  has  the  authoritative  stamp  of  so  many 
leaders  in  economics,  in  politics,  and  in  general  litera- 
ture that  it  seems  unwise  to  reject  it.  To  accept  it 
without  discrimination  is  no  less  unwise.  If  the 
term  is  taken  neither  too  seriously  nor  too  literally,  its 
use  need  not  mislead  us.  Even  the  narrower  term, 
"  the  labor  question,"  raises,  if  closely  examined, 
the  same  embarrassment,  yet  it  would  be  pedantic  to 
refuse  all  use  of  it.  Gladstone  even  gives  a  date  to 
the  rise  of  the  labor  question,  which  he  says  "  may  be 
said  to  have  come  into  public  view  simultaneously 
with  the  repeal  of  the  Combination  laws  "  (against 
trade  unions).  Do  we  find  fault  because  people  say 
there  is  a  "  servant  question  "  ?  It  lacks  definiteness, 
but  conveys  a  meaning  that  every  one  accepts.  So 
many  household  domestics  have  become  restless, 
independent,  quick  to  take  offence,  asking  many 
favors  and  perhaps  granting  few,  that  we  have  placed 
this  experience  among  our  abiding  perplexities.  We 
call  it  "  a  problem."  The  illustration  of  the  servant 
throws  light  not  only  upon  a  phrase,  but  upon  our 
whole  subject.  There  has  never  been  a  time  in  our 
history  when  the  relation  between  mistress  and  ser- 
vant was  free  from  a  great  deal  of  bickering  and 
unpleasantness.  The  entire  colonial  period  is  filled 
with  pathetic  complaining  about  servants.  Professor 
Salmon's  excellent  study1  will  satisfy  the  most  in- 

1  "  Domestic  Service,"  Macmillan  and  Co.     Especially  Chapters  III, 
and  IV. 


1 10  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

credulous  reader  on  this  point.  Yet  in  spite  of  this 
there  is  doubtless  more  of  a  "  question  "  now  than  in 
the  past.  Nor,  as  with  the  larger  issues,  is  it  any 
less  a  question  because  of  the  astonishing  improve- 
ment in  the  pay  and  conditions  of  the  servant's  life. 
I  have  known  a  woman  still  active  in  her  eighty-third 
year  who  tells  me  that  at  seventeen  she  did  the 
entire  work  of  the  household,  including  the  cooking 
and  the  care  of  the  new  baby,  for  $i  a  week. 

This  was  the  average  pay  of  her  neighborhood  in 
Massachusetts.  Thirty  years  later,  for  fewer  hours 
and  for  far  lighter  work,  her  wages  were  $3.50  and 
finally  $4.50  a  week.  This  does  not  exaggerate  the 
change  for  the  better  in  the  work  and  in  the  remuner- 
ation of  the  domestic.  Yet  never  was  more  restless- 
ness nor  the  term  of  service  shorter,  nor  the  entire 
sensitive  relation  between  mistress  and  servant  more 
fragile.  If  we  are  intelligent  enough  to  avoid  the 
vain  attempt  to  make  the  behavior  of  the  employer 
or  of  her  helper  perfectly  rational,  there  is  little  diffi- 
culty in  accounting  for  the  sentiment  from  which  the 
difficulty  chiefly  springs.  The  rise  of  wealth  has 
been  so  rapid  that  this  service  is  always  in  demand. 
There  is,  perhaps,  no  more  telling  proof  of  material 
prosperity  in  the  United  States  than  the  history 
which  domestic  service  affords.  Nothing  but  great 
material  gains  could  have  given  domestics  such  op- 
portunities within  living  memory.  Their  wages  have 
trebled  with  far  easier  tasks  and  increase  of  freedom. 
To  many  disturbed  persons  this  remarkable  progress  in 
the  lot  of  the  servant  is  precisely  what  constitutes  the 
absurdity  of  the  situation.  "  Do  these  creatures,"  it 
is  asked,  "  want  the  world  ?  "  They  want,  like  their 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  Hi 

betters,  all  they  can  get :  all  the  comforts,  all  the 
leisure,  all  the  income  they  can  command.  Content- 
ment and  docile  behavior  are  not  a  consequence  of 
enlarged  income  and  increased  well-being.  These 
new  acquisitions,  as  we  all  observe,  rarely  quiet  dis- 
content ;  oftener,  indeed,  augment  it.  Every  addition 
to  wages,  every  opportunity  opened  to  the  imagina- 
tion by  easier  travel,  by  the  press  and  by  education, 
quickens  the  desire  to  change  one's  place,  in  the  hunt 
for  a  "better  thing."  A  troubled  New  York  mistress 
says :  "  It  is  all  the  fault  of  the  New  York  World. 
My  servants  never  bothered  me  much  until  they 
got  the  habit  of  reading  every  day  the  '  ads '  and 
'wants'  in  that  paper."  But  this  lively  journal 
merely  reflects  modern  life.  All  its  agencies  tend  to 
intensify  the  consciousness  of  what  is  undesirable 
in  our  actual  possessions.  There  is  scarcely  a  device 
of  the  new  conveniences  that  does  not  plague  us  into 
dissatisfaction  with  our  actual  place  and  belongings. 
The  objectionable  self-direction  of  the  domestic  is  full 
of  unpleasantness,  but  it  is  as  futile  to  rail  at  it  as  to 
abuse  any  other  consequence  of  growing  democracy. 
I  have  seen  a  proud  woman  grow  white  with  rage 
because  a  servant,  who  had  given  references,  dared  to 
ask  for  references.  This  astonished  wrath  is  a  symbol 
of  the  conflict  of  ideals  in  this  relationship  as  well  as 
of  its  probable  duration.  However  imperfect  this 
illustration  of  the  term  "  servant  question,"  we  see, 
altogether  apart  from  its  rights  or  wrongs,  that  a 
problem  has  arisen  out  of  disturbed  feelings  as  to 
prerogatives.  It  is  purely  a  sentiment,  but  it  makes 
all  the  riddle  there  is.  The  social  question  is  but  a 
wider  and  more  complex  issue.  Its  perplexities  are 


112  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

made  from  the  same  stuff  of  human  ambitions  to  get 
on  and  up. 

We  may  now  enlarge  our  inquiry  and  ask :  Is 
there  a  social  consciousness  of  things  industrially 
wrong  that  has  definiteness,  volume,  and  persistence 
enough  to  make  a  grave  problem  for  our  time  ?  It 
would  be  fatal  to  take  the  measure  of  our  unrest  from 
the  prosperous  periods  alone.  An  average  must  be 
taken  which  includes  the  crisis  and  times  of  depres- 
sion. The  answer,  if  it  is  to  carry  conviction,  should 
point  first  to  those  facts  that  are  open  to  least  dispute 
and  to  least  misunderstanding.  I  therefore  begin  with 
an  illustration  that  shows  the  problem  in  its  very  sim- 
plest form.  In  a  town  recently  agitated  over  the  pri- 
vate ownership  of  its  waterworks,  I  was  told  by  a  large 
owner  in  the  company :  "  It  is  all  very  absurd.  We  have 
put  in  a  splendid  plant  with  all  the  new  inventions  up 
to  date.  We  have  good  water  and  plenty  of  it.  The 
rates  are  not  exorbitant,  and  this  is  admitted.  Yet, 
somehow,  there  has  been  growing  up  a  feeling  of  hos- 
tility against  the  private  company  for  a  dozen  years." 

Here,  as  in  a  child's  primer,  is  the  economic  aspect 
of  the  modern  social  question.  It  is  created  by  this 
local  feeling  of  hostility.  It  presents,  in  this  instance, 
no  difficulties  for  our  analysis  because  of  its  sim- 
plicity. Its  value  as  an  object  lesson  is  all  the  greater. 
Why,  even  with  no  very  special  abuses,  should  a  town 
be  agitated  from  so  slight  a  cause  ?  One  of  the  owners 
assured  me  it  was  all  the  work  of  two  local  dema- 
gogues. "This  nonsense  of  city  ownership,"  he 
said,  "  is  in  the  air,  and  they  make  political  capital  out 
of  it."  To  few  others  in  that  town  was  this  explana- 
tion sufficient. 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  113 

During  some  days  spent  in  this  community,  I  asked 
many  different  people  why  so  much  feeling  had 
arisen.  I  went  first  to  the  leading  merchant,  then  to 
a  lawyer,  then  to  an  editor.  What  they  had  to  tell 
was  monotonously  familiar  to  every  student  of  these 
questions.  As  in  hundreds  of  other  towns,  the  people 
of  an  earlier  generation  had  freely  given  the  right  to 
distribute  water  to  a  private  person.  He  was  the  most 
enterprising  man  in  the  town.  He  was  willing  to  take 
the  risks  and  did  in  his  time  an  unquestioned  service  to 
his  neighbors.  Incalculable  millions'  worth  of  fran- 
chises for  railroads,  street  cars,  and  lighting  companies 
have  been  given  away  in  precisely  the  same  manner. 
Many  an  interest  which  may  become  finally  a  most  ob- 
jectionable monopoly  begins  and  long  continues  to  ren- 
der indispensable  service,  just  as  the  truck  store  is  often 
at  first  useful  and  necessary  to  workmen,  but  later  may 
become  rank  with  abuses.  Populist  critics  have  been 
very  severe  against  the  railroads  because  of  the  un- 
earned increment  secured  from  the  alternate  sections 
of  land  given  by  the  government.  The  Illinois  Cen- 
tral, for  example,  secured  enormous  land  grants  in 
1850.  This  has  been  called  "a  colossal  robbery  of 
the  public  domain,"  but  no  one  will  read  the  speeches 
in  the  Thirty-first  Congress  on  this  grant,  without  see- 
ing that  it  is  very  absurd  to  call  it  robbery.1  The 
ablest  men  of  the  time — Seward,  King,  Douglas,  Cass, 
Benton,  and  Henry  Clay — believed  the  regions  through 
which  the  proposed  roads  were  to  run  to  be  practically 
worthless.  They  believed  the  risk  of  the  enterprise 
to  be  very  great.  Clay  said  :  "  There  is  nobody  who 

1  Proceedings  of  the  First  Session  of  the  Thirty-first  Congress 
(p.  844),  April  29,  1850. 


114  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

knows  anything  of  that  grand  prairie  who  does  not 
know  that  the  land  in  it  is  utterly  worthless  for  any 
present  purpose,  not  because  it  is  not  fertile,  but  for 
the  want  of  wood  and  water,  and  from  the  fact  that 
it  is  inaccessible,  wanting  all  facilities  for  reaching  a 
market  or  for  transporting  timber,  so  that  nobody 
will  go  there  and  settle  while  it  is  so  destitute  of  all 
the  advantages  of  society  and  the  conveniences  which 
arise  from  a  social  state.  And  now,  by  constructing 
this  road  through  the  prairie,  through  the  centre  of 
the  state  of  Illinois,  you  will  bring  millions  of  acres 
of  land  immediately  into  the  market  which  will  other- 
wise remain  for  years  and  years  entirely  unsalable." 

Seward  thought  the  grant  for  "the  best  and  highest 
interests  of  the  people  of  the  United  States."  The 
government,  he  adds,  "  owes  to  itself  and  to  the  states 
to  make  liberal  and  at  the  same  time  judicious  ap- 
propriations, to  extend  its  network  of  railroads  and 
canals  over  these  new  regions,  where  the  people  and 
the  government  are  unable  to  construct  the  work 
themselves." 

Benton's  words  were  as  follows :  "  The  principle 
of  the  bill  before  the  Senate  is  to  take  the  refuse 
lands  and  appropriate  them  to  a  great  object  of  in- 
ternal improvement,  which  although  it  has  its  locality 
in  a  particular  state  produces  advantages  which,  we 
all  know,  spread  far  and  wide  ;  for  a  good  road  can- 
not be  made  anywhere  without  being  beneficial  to  the 
whole  United  States.  .  .  .  Sir,  you  may  travel  a 
hundred  miles  through  a  country  of  marshes  and 
uncultivated  land,  which  is  not  only  worthless,  but  far 
worse ;  it  becomes  a  place  where  miasma  is  generated 
and  where  beasts  have  their  haunts.  But  this  bill 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  115 

proposes  to  make  some  beneficial  disposition  of  these 
lands.  Of  the  general  principle  of  the  bill  I  cordially 
approve." 

Douglas  said :  "  These  lands  have  been  in  the 
market  from  fifteen  to  thirty  years ;  the  average  time 
is  about  twenty-three  years  ;  but  they  will  not  sell  at 
the  usual  price  of  $1.25  per  acre  because  they  are 
distant  from  any  navigable  stream  or  a  market  for 
produce.  A  railroad  will  make  the  lands  salable  at 
double  the  usual  price,  because  the  improvement  made 
by  the  state  will  make  them  valuable.  It  is  an  old 
practice,  long  sanctioned  by  the  government ;  we 
propose  now  to  give  away  half  of  it  on  condition 
that  the  other  half  shall  be  rendered  worth  $2.50  per 
acre." 

King  and  Lewis  Cass  spoke  strongly  to  the  same 
effect. 

This  was  at  the  time  honest  opinion.  It  prevailed 
because  it  was  widely  believed  that  this  lavish  gift  of 
land  would  result  in  progress  for  the  common  benefit. 
In  Dr.  Robert's  admirable  "  History  of  the  Anthra- 
cite Coal  Industry,"  the  reader  may  see  how  inevi- 
tably those  precious  deposits  passed  into  private 
possessions.  It  is  a  story  in  which  the  great  risks 
taken  are  marked  by  hundreds  of  failures.  It  was 
the  exceptional  man  who  made  money.  The  com- 
munity came  to  be  grateful  to  any  one  who  could 
surmount  the  early  difficulties  and  get  coal  to 
market. 

Until  very  recent  years  the  only  public  opinion  to 
which  appeal  could  be  made  would  have  ridiculed  any 
suggestion  of  state  ownership.  With  that  easy  wis- 
dom which  comes  after  experience,  we  wish  these 


Il6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

deposits  were  public  rather  than  private  property. 
We  wish,  in  the  days  when  it  could  have  been  profit- 
ably done,  that  the  government  had  set  apart  large 
mining  tracts  just  as  New  Zealand  did,  and  as  Can- 
ada has  done.  We  were  not  wise  enough  at  the 
proper  time,  but  gave  every  legal  sanction  to  the 
private  owner. 

In  a  New  England  city  where  street  franchises  had 
proved  unexpectedly  profitable  to  a  private  company, 
I  asked  a  citizen  of  genuine  public  spirit,  who  had 
been  most  prominent  in  securing  the  franchise  for 
the  company,  what  he  now  thought  of  the  transac- 
tion. He  replied,  "  It  has  taken  two  or  three  millions 
of  money  from  the  public  and  made  a  few  men  rich, 
but  I  made  an  honest  canvass  of  the  town  and 
there  was  no  man  known  to  me  in  this  city  who  was 
not  glad  to  have  us  take  the  streets  and  give  the 
public  the  benefit  of  our  service."  Upon  the  whole 
this  stands  fairly  for  the  origin  of  most  of  these  prop- 
erties. With  the  undreamed  growth  of  cities  and  of 
population,  the  fabulous  value  of  many  of  these 
franchises  and  of  other  monopoly  privileges  slowly 
dawns  upon  us.  Both  privileges  and  abuses  have 
become  so  clear  that  the  public  rightly  insists  upon 
coming  into  an  entirely  new  relation  with  these 
bodies.  It  insists  first  that  the  public  shall  have  a 
larger  share  in  the  monopoly  gains,  chiefly  through 
some  form  of  taxation,  and  second,  that  the  public 
shall  secure  itself  against  specific  abuses  by  an  exten- 
sion of  legal  control  and  regulation.  There  is  no 
more  competent  or  conservative  opinion  in  the  United 
States  than  that  which  makes  these  two  demands. 
The  degree  to  which  taxation  and  regulation  shall  be 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  117 

carried,  will  more  and  more  divide  candid  opinion 
along  the  lines  that  separate  the  individualist  from 
the  socialist.  If  the  socialistic  sympathy  is  strong, 
it  will  insist  that  no  "  regulation  "  can  long  repress 
the  evils  of  private  ownership  in  any  business  that  is 
fairly  termed  monopolistic.  The  battle  is  now  on 
in  this  country  between  "  regulation "  and  public 
ownership  for  certain  forms  of  monopoly. 

In  the  instance  above  given  of  city  waterworks, 
the  growth  of  a  sentiment  toward  public  ownership 
may  be  seen  in  its  very  simplest  form.  A  strong 
man  with  his  lawyer  secured  the  water  privilege.  A 
small  number  of  influential  people  were  allowed  to 
take  stock,  and  ample  dividends  followed.  Rank 
abuses  or  gross  corruption  were  never  charged.  The 
editor  admitted  that  "  the  private  company  could  per- 
haps give  us  water  as  cheaply  as  it  could  be  given 
under  public  ownership.  "The  trouble  is,"  he  added, 
"  that  a  great  deal  of  suspicion  has  been  roused 
because  of  the  secrecy  connected  with  the  whole  busi- 
ness. We  have  found  out  that  a  small  set  of  citi- 
zens have  a  high  class  investment.  They  give  a 
good  many  reasons  to  prove  that  their  management 
is  excellent.  It  is  not  this  so  much  that  we  doubt  as 
that  we  don't  really  know  what  they  get  or  what  the 
public  loses.  Some  ten  years  ago  lectures  on  munic- 
ipal ownership  were  given  for  the  first  time  in  this 
community.  That  started  the  discussion  in  the  local 
papers.  From  that  time  the  agitation  has  not  ceased, 
and  it  won't  cease  till  we  have  the  corporation  in 
public  hands.  I  am  convinced  that  those  business 
men  and  lawyers  who  control  the  corporation  can 
easily  enough  keep  the  plums  for  themselves.  They 


Il8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

are  shrewd  enough  to  understand  that  they  must 
serve  us  fairly  well  and  have  no  scandal.  They  can 
do  that  and  still  keep  gains  for  themselves  that  ought 
to  go  to  all  of  us."  The  history  of  the  ownership  of 
waterworks  in  the  United  States  is  told  in  this  simple 
testimony. 

But  a  great  deal  more  is  told  than  this.  When  the 
director  of  the  water  company  said,  "  Somehow  there 
has  been  growing  up  a  feeling  of  hostility  against 
the  private  company  for  a  dozen  years,"  he  put 
the  general  experience  of  a  generation  into  a  sen- 
tence. It  is  not  certain  that  upon  strictly  business 
grounds  this  hostile  judgment  was  sound.  It  is  cer- 
tainly possible  that  under  private  ownership  water 
may  be  distributed  as  well  and  as  cheaply  as  under 
public  management ;  but,  in  this  instance,  as  in  hun- 
dreds of  others,  the  people  had  come  to  have  so 
much  doubt  and  suspicion  that  an  issue  was  raised. 
The  slow  growth  of  this  town  feeling  against  a  nat- 
ural monopoly  is,  upon  its  economic  side,  the  essence  of 
the  entire  social  question.  It  was  in  a  large  neighbor- 
ing city  that  I  was  told,  by  a  writer  of  national  reputa- 
tion, that  his  attention  to  socialistic  problems  was  first 
aroused  by  the  solicitude  of  certain  directors  in  a 
private  city  gas  company,  that  considerable  blocks 
of  stock  should  be  sold  to  picked  citizens.  One 
director  was  frank  in  his  statement.  "There  is  a 
good  deal  of  crazy  talk  in  the  air  about  city  control 
of  gas.  It  is  so  valuable  a  property  that  the  possess- 
ors of  it  are  sure  to  oppose  any  movement  to  take 
it  over  by  the  city,  therefore  we  must  see  to  it  that 
the  really  influential  people,  or  those  who  might 
cause  us  trouble,  have  the  stock."  Professor  Rich- 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  119 

ard  T.  Ely  has  told  me  of  an  amusingly  similar  experi- 
ence. The  machinery  of  the  water  supply,  ministering 
to  the  necessities  of  the  whole  population,  was  nar- 
rowly owned.  The  business  was  extremely  simple, 
the  demand  for  water  constant  and  increasing,  the 
risks  were  few.  Given  this  situation,  the  public  is 
sure,  upon  the  slightest  suspicion,  to  ask  why  the 
machinery  should  not  be  owned  by  the  town  it  serves. 
If  it  is  a  good  property  for  the  few,  why  may  it  not 
be  profitable  to  the  many  ?  To  this  it  is  said :  "  Ev- 
erybody cannot  manage  expensive  machinery  as  well 
as  the  selected  few  in  a  private  company.  The  few, 
guided  by  self-interest,  have  superior  ability."  The 
people  have  learned  to  make  one  troublesome  inquiry 
about  this  private  superiority.  They  ask,  even  if 
private  control  is  more  effective,  do  the  people  neces- 
sarily get  the  advantage,  or  does  it  pass  to  private 
pockets?  Suspicion  upon  this  point  increases  among 
us  every  year.  When  the  last  century  came  in  (with 
one  or  two  exceptions),  all  waterworks  were  private 
property.  To-day,  certainly,  more  than  one-half  are 
under  public  control,  and  the  tendency  is  so  strong  in 
this  direction  that  the  discussion  may  be  said  to  be 
practically  final  for  public  ownership  in  this  one 
department. 

As  we  pass  to  the  more  complicated  machinery, — 
that,  for  example,  of  city  lighting,  telegraph,  and 
transportation,  —  opinion  is  not  convinced  as  in  the 
case  of  waterworks,  but  he  is  a  dull  observer  who 
does  not  recognize  that  the  tendency  is  as  steadily  in 
that  direction  as  the  movement  of  a  glacier  among 
the  great  peaks  is  toward  the  valleys  below. 

The  contests  over  electric  lighting,  except  in  tech- 


120  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

nical  respects,  are  still  relatively  simple,  because 
vested  interests  have  not  grown  into  baffling  en- 
tanglements. The  risks  are  far  greater  than  with 
water  because  electrical  mechanism  is  still  in  an 
experimental  stage,  requiring  rapid,  constant,  and  ex- 
pensive changes.  This  fact  would,  in  theory,  seem 
to  justify  the  city  in  throwing  the  risks  of  such  ex- 
pensive changes  upon  private  companies.  Some 
German  municipalities  that  have  adopted  the  prin- 
ciple of  municipal  ownership  are  careful  to  leave 
a  risky  responsibility  of  this  kind  to  private  enter- 
prise. Yet,  in  spite  of  these  delicate  risks,  an  increas- 
ing number  of  our  cities  adopts  public  control  for  the 
same  reasons  that  have  brought  the  changes  in  the 
furnishing  of  water. 

The  machinery  of  street  transportation  brings  new 
complications  because  of  the  greater  magnitude  of 
the  problem,  and  because  of  older  vested  interests. 
Yet,  who  that  follows  the  history  of  popular  feeling 
on  these  subjects  in  our  large  cities  doubts  that  the 
same  critical  spirit  is  steadily  growing  against  the 
private  management  of  the  street-car  service.  With 
a  far  greater  machine — railroad  transportation  and 
large  portions  of  our  mining,  that  are  inextricably  a 
part  of  the  railroad  —  the  purely  practical  difficulties 
of  public  control  in  our  country  become  formidable 
in  the  extreme.  Yet  no  array  of  difficulties  can  hold 
in  abeyance  the  same  sentiment  that  the  railroad 
machinery  might  in  some  way  be  used  for  a  larger 
common  good. 

I  am  not  now  arguing  for  collective  ownership, 
but  trying  to  test  the  currents  of  opinion.  Whether 
the  opinion  is  discreet  or  foolhardy,  it  is  as  a  fact 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  121 

growing  more  and  more  distrustful  of  exclusive 
proprietorship  over  certain  forms  of  industrial  ma- 
chinery that  are  conspicuously  essential  to  wide 
public  interests.  On  its  economic  side,  this  distrust 
is  the  irritating  heart  of  our  social  problem.  I  have 
seen  a  chart  giving  the  growth  of  this  sentiment 
against  all  forms  of  the  great  machinery  that  is 
loosely  classed  as  semi-public  corporations  in  nine 
different  countries.  The  result  is  practically  every- 
where the  same,  though  with  varying  intensity.  It 
is  found  in  free  and  democratic  Switzerland,  Aus- 
tralia, New  Zealand,  and  England,  as  well  as  in  auto- 
cratic Germany.  Forms  of  government  seem  alike 
indifferent  to  the  process  of  socializing  this  machin- 
ery. Given  a  certain  degree  of  industrial  develop- 
ment, and  the  inevitable  result  follows  of  continuous 
extension  of  the  public  function,  —  railroad,  telegraph, 
telephone,  gas,  electric  lights,  street  cars,  and  of 
innumerable  public  works.  If  there  is  any  authority 
in  the  cumulative  experience  of  industrial  evolution 
over  so  wide  an  area  and  under  circumstances  so 
diverse,  this  would  appear  to  furnish  a  trustworthy 
instance.  This  fact  of  long  and  persistent  experience 
under  a  great  variety  of  national  and  social  conditions 
has  the  weight  and  sanction  which  every  consider- 
able record  of  social  growth  must  always  carry 
with  it. 

For  proofs  of  this  tendency  we  need  not  turn  alone 
to  foreign  peoples.  The  achieved  result  of  public 
management  is  in  its  infancy  with  us,  but  the  first 
great  step  of  transformed  opinion  and  tentative  legis- 
lation has  already  been  taken.  Dr.  Whitten  of  the 
State  Library  at  Albany  publishes  bulletins  which 


122  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

show  how  steady  and  strong  the  drift  of  public  legis- 
lation has  become  among  us.1  Commenting  upon 
this,  a  writer  in  the  Nation  observes,  "  If  we  define 
socialism  as  the  tendency  to  enlarge  the  functions  of 
government,  we  must  admit  that  the  general  drift  is 
in  that  direction."  One  of  the  older  of  the  Boston 
lawyers,  who  had  occasion  to  examine  these  statutes 
in  the  different  states,  writes :  "  We  seem  to  be  giving 
up  all  ideas  of  state  functions  that  I  was  taught  were 
sound.  My  college  instructors  were  very  dogmatic 
about  the  work  which  the  city,  state,  and  government 
could  undertake.  Experience  has,  I  think,  turned 
every  one  of  their  reasons  topsy-turvy.  Somewhere 
in  the  world  I  see  that  the  community  is  doing  satis- 
factorily what  my  teachers  proved  to  us  boys  could 
not  possibly  be  done  without  confusion  and  catas- 
trophe." Still  wayward  and  uncertain  of  itself,  the 
general  movement  is  now  easily  discernible. 

If  confined  to  its  economic  aspects,  the  dissatisfac- 
tion out  of  which  the  social  question  springs  has  its 
origin  largely  in  the  growing  belief  that  mechanical 
science  and  invention  applied  to  industry  are  too 
closely  held  by  private  interests.  An  enormous 
private  ownership  of  industrial  mechanism,  especially 
if  coupled  with  lands  and  mines,  is  now  clearly  seen 
to  carry  with  it  powers  and  privileges  that  may 
easily  be  turned  against  every  promise  of  free  and 
democratic  society.  If  it  is  true  that  dissatisfaction 
has  gained  such  headway  as  to  disturb  more  and 
more  the  currents  of  our  social  and  political  life, 
that  of  itself  makes  the  problem  of  our  time. 

Let  us  test  this  briefly,  first,  by  reference  to  gen- 

1 "  The  Trend  of  Legislation  in  the  United  States." 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  123 

eral  opinion,  second  to  organized  labor,  third  to  cer- 
tain farmers'  associations. 


General  Opinion 

In  one  of  the  largest  business  men's  clubs  in  this 
country  I  listened  recently  to  a  discussion  upon  Mu- 
nicipal Ownership.  At  the  close  of  the  meeting  the 
president  of  the  club  said  :  "  I  would  not  have  believed 
that  notions  could  change  so  rapidly  on  any  subject 
as  they  have  upon  this.  Ten  years  ago  this  audi- 
ence would  have  listened  perhaps  to  a  plea  for  munic- 
ipal control  of  street  cars,  lighting,  etc.,  but  not  ten 
men  in  the  room  would  have  believed  a  word  of  it. 
To-night,  a  third  of  the  members,  whose  interests  are 
not  endangered,  would  vote  for  it,  and  most  of  the 
others  would  go  so  far  as  to  admit  that  the  proposal 
deserved  very  careful  discussion."  A  lawyer  promi- 
nent enough  to  be  president  of  the  local  Bar  Associa- 
tion added  :  "  Even  five  years  ago  it  was  hard  to  find 
any  strong  man  in  the  club  who  felt  interest  enough 
to  talk  about  the  topics  two  minutes.  To-day  few 
topics  are  certain  to  excite  livelier  discussion."  I 
asked  to  what  cause  he  attributed  the  change. 
"  Chiefly,"  he  replied,  "  to  the  facts  brought  out  by  lo- 
cal reform  associations.  They  have  proved  to  every- 
body, what  many  of  us  knew  and  all  suspected,  that 
the  city  council  was  as  regularly  debauched  by  these 
corporations  as  the  necessities  of  their  business  ex- 
tension required.  The  directors  always  cry  out,  '  We 
are  under  a  perpetual  blackmail,  and  therefore  can't 
help  buying  aldermen.'  If  they  tell  us  the  truth,  if 
regular  corruption  is  a  necessity  of  private  manage- 


124  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

ment  in  this  city,  then  it  is  too  dangerous  a  power  to 
intrust  to  such  a  body.  Though  the  city  would,  of 
course,  run  the  same  risks  of  political  abuse,  it  would 
be  better  for  the  public  to  take  the  responsibilities 
openly,  and  meet  them  as  best  it  can." 

This  illustration  possibly  overstates  the  change  of 
general  opinion  throughout  the  country,  but  it  indi- 
cates fairly  how  great  a  change  has  been  wrought. 
To  hear  these  views  from  the  ablest  practical  men 
is  no  longer  a  surprise.  The  tone  of  editorial  dis- 
cussion is  just  as  marked.  One  of  the  most  influen- 
tial of  Massachusetts  dailies  now  boldly  takes  ground 
in  favor  of  public  management,  even  of  railroads,  tele- 
graph, and  telephone.  Two  others  are  ready  at  all 
times  to  discuss  the  municipal  issue  with  that  open- 
ness of  mind  which  assumes  it  to  be  an  unsettled 
question.  The  editor  of  one  of  these  papers  tells 
me  point  blank,  "  Personally,  I  have  no  doubt  we 
are  coming  to  city  ownership,  and  ought  to  come 
to  it." 

The  current  literature  in  favor  of  extending  the 
functions  of  the  city  has  come  to  be  so  prolific  that 
it  is  hard,  even  for  the  special  student,  to  follow  it. 
For  some  years  I  classified  the  articles  upon  this  sub- 
ject as  they  appeared  in  general  magazine  literature. 
A  dozen  years  ago  the  task  was  light,  but  a  year 
since,  from  sheer  weariness  at  the  amount  of  matter, 
the  task  was  discontinued.  In  one  of  our  largest 
libraries,  the  librarian,  struggling  with  the  difficul- 
ties of  a  new  catalogue,  told  me  "  our  greatest  nui- 
sance is  the  increasing  mass  of  literature  on  social 
questions.  Are  people  growing  crazy  on  that  sub- 
ject?" 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  12$ 

Capitalists,  and  the  agents  who  act  for  them,  are 
daily  furnishing  testimony  to  the  same  effect. 

An  able  article  in  Municipal  Engineering,  by  J.  B. 
Cahoon,  warns  capitalists  not  to  oppose  state  regula- 
tion. He  fears  and  opposes  city  ownership,  but  says 
to  his  business  friends :  "  There  lie  open  to  us  two 
paths,  municipal  ownership  or  private  ownership 
under  state  regulation.  We  certainly  do  not  want 
municipal  ownership,  therefore  let  us  prepare  to  ac- 
cede gracefully  to  the  other  course ;  and  not  only  that, 
but  let  us  help  it  along.  In  that  lies  our  salvation." 
He  then  adds,  "  I  doubt  if  there  are  in  this  whole  as- 
sociation a  dozen  members  who  realize  fully  the  grav- 
ity of  the  present  situation  for  the  private  ownership 
of  public  utilities."  "The  number  of  agitators  that 
are  crying  municipal  ownership  of  public  utilities  is 
constantly  and  rapidly  increasing ;  they  are  attack- 
ing us  in  all  parts  of  the  country,  even  now,  and  the 
attack  will  be  stronger  and  stronger  as  time  goes  on." 1 

Views  of  Organized  Labor 

It  is  dangerous  to  report  class  opinions.  "What 
labor  thinks  "  has  been  the  lying  text  of  many  a 
demagogue.  There  is  no  uniformity  of  conviction 
upon  a  single  industrial  topic  among  some  twenty 
millions  who  work  for  wages  in  the  United  States. 
It  is  only  in  the  case  of  labor  organized  that  one  may 

1 1  am  told  by  an  official  of  a  telephone  company  that  the  agitation 
for  municipal  ownership  has  developed  so  far  that  the  company  has 
quietly  gathered  from  all  sources  every  fragment  of  available  evidence 
bearing  on  the  problem.  "  We  propose,"  he  said,  "  to  be  better 
equipped  than  the  cranks  when  the  fight  conies  on." 


126  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

speak  with  the  least  degree  of  assurance.  Though 
this  is  but  a  small  fraction,  —  perhaps  one  in  fourteen 
or  fifteen,  — its  weight  in  terms  of  opinion  is  far  more 
important  than  is  signified  by  numbers.  This  or- 
ganized minority  has  scores  of  trade  journals.  It 
has  a  literature  and  extensive  agencies  for  propa- 
ganda. It  has  a  steady  tendency  to  set  the  current 
of  beliefs  among  a  far  larger  number  than  that  under 
the  immediate  control  of  the  union.  To  treat  these 
convictions,  therefore,  as  of  slight  account  is  the  kind 
of  error  for  which  no  one  seems  to  have  so  special  a 
talent  as  the  so-called  practical  man. 

The  new  step  taken  by  organized  labor  in  this 
country  during  the  last  ten  years  is  to  learn  the  pos- 
sibilities of  political  action.  Twenty  years  ago  those 
who  guided  the  movement  were  afraid  of  politics,  to- 
day they  see  in  its  skilful  manoeuvring  a  new  hope 
and  a  new  era. 

The  shrewdest  trade-union  leaders  observed  in  the 
great  strikes  of  1892  and  1894  that  the  chances  of 
favoring  political  influence  (if  the  right  moment  for 
the  strike  were  chosen)  were  full  of  promise.  The 
brilliant  victory  of  the  strike  of  1900,  led  by  John 
Mitchell,  and  deliberately  aided  by  the  most  influen- 
tial man  then  in  Congress,  so  confirmed  this  impres- 
sion that  the  great  labor  struggles  of  the  future  will 
have  a  still  closer  and  more  calculated  reference  to 
politics.  As  this  conscious  alliance  strengthens,  it 
will  become  almost  more  dangerous  to  defeat  the  strike 
than  to  help  it  toward  victory.  Increasingly,  too,  the 
issues  upon  which  strikes  of  the  first  magnitude  will 
turn  are  issues  that  bring  us  face  to  face  with  the 
alternative  of  public  control.  The  general  interest 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  127 

and  attention  are  henceforth  directed  along  socialistic 
lines,  not  by  books,  but  by  stirring  events.  The  influ- 
ence of  this  close  relation  upon  trade-union  convic- 
tions is  already  apparent. 

The  older  trade-union  faiths  were  oftener  individu- 
alistic than  collectivist.  Year  by  year  they  have 
been  modified,  until  it  may  be  said  that  they  will 
soon  be,  if  they  are  not  already,  practically  unani- 
mous in  demanding  public  control  of  the  natural 
monopolies,  —  gas,  electric  light,  street  cars,  as  well 
as  railroads,  telegraph,  and  mines.  If  it  is  asked 
what  has  solidified  their  thought  upon  this  subject, 
the  answer  is  found  in  a  wide  and  very  bitter  experi- 
ence. I  shall  not  claim  that  their  ordeals  have  been 
undeserved.  I  shall  not  hold  the  unions  guiltless  of 
many  special  acts  of  intolerable  behavior.  The  aim 
is  now  not  to  judge  their  conduct,  but  to  know  their 
opinions  and  the  changes  they  have  undergone. 

Their  views  vary,  step  by  step,  as  certain  forms  of 
machinery  develop  and  react  upon  labor.  As  the 
iron  takes  its  shape  between  hammer  and  anvil,  labor 
organization  has  been  made  by  the  organization  of 
machine  industry.  But  for  the  introduction  of  these 
inventions,  and  the  way  in  which  they  have  been 
applied  to  industry,  the  laborer  never  would  have 
submitted  to  the  long  and  terrible  sacrifices  that 
organization  has  cost  him.  For  the  cities  where  the 
unions  have  won  their  strength,  the  most  telling  ob- 
ject lesson  has  been  the  mechanism  of  street  trans- 
portation. This  is  the  great  machine  of  the  city,  as 
the  railroad  is  for  the  country  at  large.  For  a  quar- 
ter of  a  century  the  strikes  upon  street  cars  and  rail- 
roads have  brought  home  to  the  trade  union  the  most 


128  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

instructive  lessons  it  has  learned  in  this  country.  As 
this  labor  has  thrown  itself  against  semi-public  corpora- 
tions it  has  been  made  to  see  the  hard  limits  beyond 
which  mere  unionism  cannot  go.  It  is  thus  with  every 
defeated  strike  that  one  sees  the  employees  turning 
with  steadily  growing  conviction  against  private  owner- 
ship and  in  favor  of  public,  in  the  hope  that  favors 
can  be  forced  from  the  public  which  the  private  cor- 
poration refuses. 

Especially  in  its  conflict  with  natural  monopolies 
like  street-car  companies  has  labor  learned  its  politics. 
In  the  heat  of  more  than  six  hundred  such  strikes 
it  has  been  taught  how  the  powerful  natural  mo- 
nopoly within  the  city  is  guarded  by  secret  privileges 
won  in  the  lobbies.  It  is  in  part  the  knowledge  of 
this  that  so  rouses  the  wide  public  sympathy  which 
we  have  seen  with  the  strikers  in  so  many  of  our 
cities. 

In  Milwaukee,  after  the  great  strike,  I  found  neither 
doubt  nor  hesitation  that  the  angry  popular  suspicion 
of  undue  political  influence  was  justified.  The  reign- 
ing political  party  had  its  roots  deep  in  city  affairs. 
Contracts  were  made  to  the  direct  end  of  strengthen- 
ing this  hold.  The  heat  engendered  by  every  such 
strike  brings  these  facts  to  light.  I  was  told  by  a 
citizen  and  stockholder,  whose  judgment  was  thought 
to  have  special  value,  that  it  was  well  the  people 
knew  so  little.  Their  suspicions,  he  said,  "  are  more 
than  justified.  I  hate  all  talk  about  socialism,  but 
this  strike  has  taught  me  a  lesson  I  never  could  have 
learned  from  books.  This  form  of  city  monopoly, 
half  private,  half  public,  has  got  to  be  brought  under 
thorough  and  consistent  municipal  direction.  Whether 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  129 

we  should  lease  it  out  or  own  and  manage  it,  I  do  not 
know,  but  we  are  near  the  end  of  all  ownership  that 
is  not  far  more  responsible  to  the  public  than  anything 
we  have  known  here."  A  leader  among  the  work- 
men said,  "  Nothing  that  has  ever  happened  has 
done  so  much  to  turn  our  men  toward  municipal 
socialism  as  this  strike."  There  is  scarcely  a  limit  to 
the  amount  of  testimony  to  be  adduced  from  scores 
of  cities  in  the  United  States.  In  an  economic  study 
which  was  pronounced  "careful  and  judicious"  by  a 
committee  of  the  American  Economic  Association,1 
the  reader  has  a  glimpse  of  the  entire  street-car 
problem  in  the  United  States.  For  magnitude  of  de- 
moralization, the  instance  here  given  does  not  com- 
pare with  some  of  the  railroad  corporations,  but  its 
narrowed  area  enables  the  investigator  to  report  upon 
it  with  much  closer  accuracy.  As  this  Cleveland  ma- 
chinery of  transportation  slowly  consolidates,  offering 
ever  more  glittering  prizes  to  private  ownership,  the 
author  tells  us  the  result. 

"  It  has  brought  together  a  combination  of  men 
whose  commercial  and  political  power  is  practically 
unlimited.  Representing  as  they  do,  with  their 
associates,  the  managers  of  both  party  '  machines,' 
it  makes  little  difference  which  party  is  in  power,  so 
far  as  gaining  their  ends  is  concerned.  And  this 
power  extends  beyond  municipal  into  state  matters 
as  well.  Legislatures  as  well  as  councils  are  made 
the  tools  of  these  corporations.  The  fifty-year  fran- 
chise bill  was  almost  as  much  a  party  measure  as  the 
election  of  the  United  States  senator  who  championed 

1  "The  Street    Railway  Problem   in  Cleveland,"  Macmillan,  1896. 
Especially  pages  313,  315,  354. 
K 


130  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

it.  The  same  forces  which  made  him  senator  made 
this  bill  a  law. 

"  When  we  approach  the  question  of  corruption  in 
the  award  of  franchises,  it  must  be  admitted  that  the 
system  has  thus  far  put  an  immense  premium  upon 
all  sorts  of  jobbery  and  corruption.  The  street  rail- 
way interest  has  been  all-powerful  in  the  control  of 
political  machines.  It  has  not  only  secured,  appar- 
ently for  the  mere  asking,  the  most  valuable  privileges 
which  the  city  council  could  bestow,  but  it  has  also 
escaped  the  performance  of  many  obligations  which 
the  state  has  compelled  the  council  to  make  a  con- 
dition of  its  grants.  It  has  prevented  the  enforce- 
ment of  nearly  every  law  which  it  has  not  cared  to 
obey.  And  now  it  has  an  enormous  inducement  to 
corrupt  a  majority  of  the  council  in  order  to  obtain 
the  most  valuable  grant  ever  put  into  the  hands  of 
that  body  to  bestow.  All  this  it  has  been  enabled 
and  encouraged  to  do  under  the  present  system, 
which  offers  to  unscrupulous  men  both  the  motive 
and  the  power  to  corrupt  the  city  government." 

With  tiresome  uniformity  this  is  the  story  of  other 
cities.  No  body  of  citizens  has  shown  a  readier  wit 
to  discover  these  facts  than  the  trade  unions.  Their 
journals  show  how  early  they  were  to  appreciate  the 
drift  of  events  and  to  understand  their  bearing  upon 
labor  interests.  With  every  new  object  lesson  of  suc- 
cessful or  defeated  strike,  this  group  opinion  has  grown 
more  confident  and  more  definite ;  that  monopolized 
machinery  of  city  transportation,  lighting,  and  tele- 
phone should  be  taken  over  by  the  public  authorities. 
Twenty  years  ago  opinion  was  formless  and  hesitating, 
to-day  it  is  clear  and  decisive. 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  131 

The  Farmers 

As  in  the  case  of  the  industrial  laborer,  we  have 
to  consider  on  the  agricultural  field  only  those  among 
the  farmers  who  have  established  organizations.  We 
have  even  to  omit  certain  granges  whose  purpose 
is  almost  exclusively  social  and  agricultural.  Much 
amazement  is  expressed  at  the  massing  of  great  capitals, 
but  if  difficulties  are  taken  into  account,  it  is  perhaps 
no  more  an  object  of  surprise  than  that  millions  of 
farmers,  since  1867,  should  have  organized  to  such 
extent  for  what  they  believe  to  be  their  own  defence. 
They  were  bound  together  neither  by  common  tra- 
dition nor  common  politics.  Their  resources  were 
scanty  and  they  were  separated  by  wide  geographical 
distances.  The  real  beginnings  are  soon  after  the 
Civil  War,  when  invention,  as  applied  to  industry,  was 
organized  for  the  first  time  in  our  history  upon  a 
great  scale.  As  if  by  some  impulse  common  to  them 
all,  business,  trade  unions,  railroads,  farmers,  and  even 
charities  are  caught  by  this  new  spirit  of  organiza- 
tion. Only  two  years  after  the  close  of  the  war  the 
"  Patrons  of  Husbandry  "  was  founded.  This  order 
began  with  the  vaguest  statement  as  to  aims,  such  as 
"  industrial  benefits  and  the  social  improvement  of  its 
members."  Vigorous  efforts  were  made,  as  with  the 
earlier  trade  unions,  to  exclude  all  discussion  of 
politics.  This  nervous  solicitude  to  eschew  politics  is 
full  of  significance.  Protesting  never  so  loudly  that 
they  will  shun  politics,  they  have  year  by  year  yielded 
more  to  its  claims. 

The  deepest  purpose  in  most  great  movements 
comes  tardily  to  consciousness  and  is  openly  admitted 


132  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

with  extreme  reluctance.  Early  in  the  Reformation, 
Luther  is  vehement  in  asserting,  "  I  will  do  nothing 
against  his  Holiness,  the  Pope."  Lincoln  was  sin- 
cere in  repeating  that  "  he  has  no  purpose,  directly  or 
indirectly,  to  interfere  with  the  institution  of  slavery 
in  the  states  where  it  exists,"  that  he  has  "no  lawful 
right  to  do  so."  Yet  the  movement  behind  both  these 
strong  men  drove  them  to  eat  their  own  words.  In 
the  first  decade  of  the  farmers'  agitation  there  is 
much  honest  and  well-meant  horror  of  questioning 
the  infallibility  of  party  politics.  The  discontents 
that  gathered  about  the  crisis  of  1873  raised  the 
number  of  grangers  to  thirty  thousand  in  1875. 
Then  come  internal  jealousies,  the  inevitable  conflict 
of  discordant  aims,  and  the  "dangerous  effects  of 
prosperity."  The  strength  of  this  organization  as  an 
influence  continued  hardly  more  than  ten  years.  Re- 
viewing its  history  in  1891,  leaders  justified  their  work 
by  pointing  to  its  influence  in  lessening  the  patent- 
monopoly  of  sewing  machines,  "thus  saving,"  as 
they  say,  "  millions  to  the  people  annually " ;  in 
directing  a  successful  agitation  against  transportation 
companies  by  helping  on  the  interstate  commerce  law, 
etc.  They  have  also  much  to  say  about  oleomar- 
garine, agricultural  stations,  and  arbor  days.  But 
chiefly  to  be  noticed  is  the  unmistakable  beginning 
of  opposition  to  the  forms  of  monopolized  machinery 
that  concerns  the  farmer's  life.  In  1880,  a  larger 
organization  takes  the  field  in  the  South,  the 
Farmers'  Alliance.  This  soon  adopts  six  ethical 
and  educational  generalities,  in  the  first  of  which  "a 
strictly  non-partisan  spirit"  is  taken.  It  gradually 
federates  with  other  farmers'  organizations,  until  a 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  133 

"  union  platform  "  is  adopted,  including  the  aims  of 
the  northern  and  western  associations,  as  well  as 
those  of  the  Knights  of  Labor.  Politics  now  becomes 
a  conscious  purpose,  and  a  new  and  bolder  position  is 
taken  toward  the  currency  and  methods  of  exchange 
and  transportation.  The  National  Farmers'  Alliance 
in  the  Middle  West  had,  as  early  as  1877,  brought 
politics  and  "  anti-monopolies  "  to  the  front.  At  the 
Cincinnati  convention  in  1891  the  full  spirit  of  the 
peoples  party,  with  its  political  and  economic  ideals, 
takes  shape.  The  evils  to  be  overcome  are  now  far 
more  definite.  Landownership  by  foreign  syndi- 
cates is  opposed ;  lands  that  have  been  taken  by 
railroads  and  other  corporations,  in  excess  of  actual 
working  necessities,  are  to  be  reclaimed  by  govern- 
ment ;  railroads  and  telegraphs  are  to  be  taken  over 
and  operated  by  the  state. 

When  it  was  said  to  the  farmer,  "Your  produce 
would  rot  in  the  field  if  it  were  not  for  the  railroad 
and  this  same  money  power,"  the  usual  answer  was, 
"We  farmers  understand  our  interests  well  enough 
to  know  that,  but  we  also  know  that  it  is  only  half  of 
the  truth."  From  1867  to  the  present,  the  conviction 
has  deepened  that  "  some  way  must  be  found  in  which 
these  mighty  agencies  can  be  used  more  equitably 
for  the  public  good  and  less  exclusively  for  fattening 
the  few."  The  whole  movement  is  created  by  this 
feeling. 

The  mere  text  of  these  programmes  is,  of  course,  not 
sufficient  to  tell  us  what  the  most  tenacious  purpose 
of  the  party  is.  Platforms  are  padded  like  those  of 
the  republican  and  democratic  parties.  Beyond  the 
printed  rhetoric  is  the  real  aim  of  the  stronger  spirits 


134  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

that  cannot  wholly  display  itself.  During  the  cam- 
paign of  1897  in  Chicago,  I  asked  three  of  the  most 
influential  men  then  crying  for  free  silver,  if  "  16  to 
i  "  represented  the  most  fundamental  changes  which 
they  desired.  It  appeared  in  each  case  that  the  "  grip 
of  the  money  power  "  was  the  deeper  problem.  One, 
whose  writings  had  done  much  to  inspire  the  party, 
assured  me  that  the  actual  issue  was  of  course  impor- 
tant, but  he  added,  "  the  evil  that  we  are  after  is  that 
connected  with  the  great  monopolies."  The  leader 
of  this  movement  in  Massachusetts  says,  "  Practical 
reasons  forced  us  to  bring  the  silver  issue  to  the  front, 
but  the  great  interest  which  unites  us  all  is  the  danger- 
ous business  and  political  influence  which  the  money 
power  has  at  last  got  in  this  country." 

Here  is  the  misfortune  of  this  much-bewildered 
party,  that  its  grievances  have  such  heterogeneous 
character  and  are  so  difficult  to  formulate.  The 
stupendous  organization  of  industrial  and  scientific 
invention  is  now  under  the  control  of  the  strong  and 
successful.  A  thousand  privileges,  political  and  legal, 
protect  them  in  their  possessions.  The  laws  of  inheri- 
tance multiply  every  advantage.  Many  of  our  strong- 
est papers  are  at  the  disposition  of  these  interests, 
often,  indeed,  their  private  property,  and  legislatures 
and  city  councils  are  frequently  moulded  to  their 
wish.  What  can  the  invertebrate  multitude,  torn 
by  many  conflicting  interests,  do  before  a  power  so 
formidable  ?  Thus  far  it  cannot  even  state  its  own 
case.  This  it  is  which  gives  a  merciless  advantage 
to  every  critic  of  the  peoples  party.  The  very 
term  "money  power"  has  become  a  cant  well-nigh 
intolerable.  There  is  scarcely  a  severer  test  to  fair- 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  135 

ness  than  that  to  which  the  student  must  submit,  as 
he  passes  judgment  upon  the  thirty  years'  history  of 
the  farmers'  agitation.  To  hold  it  to  the  mere  letter 
of  its  complaint  is  unjust. 

The  most  frequent  critical  judgment  is  that  the 
one  thing  all  populists  are  after  is  fiat  money.  This 
craze  is  said  to  be  the  one  thing  that  unites  them. 
There  is  much  truth  in  this,  but  it  requires  a  most 
important  qualification.  Views  upon  the  currency 
alone  do  not  test  this  movement.  A  fairer  reading 
of  populist  opinion  shows  that  money  is  conceived 
of  as  an  interlinked  part  of  our  commercial  mecha- 
nism. It  is  thought  of  as  a  medium  through  which 
this  mechanism  is  vitalized.  The  instinct  which  seeks 
to  change  the  monetary  system  is  the  same  instinct 
which  seeks  more  power  over  the  railroad,  the  bank, 
the  stock  exchange,  the  telegraph,  and  the  grain 
elevator. 

To  see  the  movement  as  one  against  the  too  exclu- 
sive use  of  this  industrial  machinery,  is  to  see  it  in 
a  light  that  helps  us  interpret  it,  without  violence  to 
what  is  deepest  and  most  permanent  in  it.  The 
social  question  is  forever  an  attack  upon  what,  in 
some  form,  is  thought  to  be  unfair  privilege.  Eco- 
nomic privilege  is  now  an  inseparable  part  of  the 
machinery  of  modern  production  and  distribution. 
The  farmer  attacks  railroads  because  they  touch  him 
at  so  visible  and  sensitive  a  point.  He  strikes  wildly 
at  "futures"  on  the  stock  exchange,  at  our  banking 
system,  at  the  "  single  standard,"  because  these  are 
to  him  the  express  tokens  of  industrial  privilege. 
It  is  this  ultimate  and  determining  impulse  which 
enables  us  to  give  this  agitation  its  proper  name. 


136  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Stripped  of  its  padding  and  accidents,  it  is  a  socialist 
propaganda. 

During  eight  yearly  visits  through  Western  towns, 
covering  a  period  of  hard  times  and  a  period  of 
exceptionally  good  times,  I  tried  to  gather  evidence 
upon  this  question.  There  are  two  extreme  condi- 
tions to  be  kept  in  mind.  There  are  first,  vast 
fertile  areas  on  which  the  farmer  is  as  prosperous 
and  contented  as  any  class  with  which  it  is  fair 
to  compare  him.  There  are  other  wide  areas,  like 
parts  of  Kansas  and  Nebraska,  in  which  capricious 
climate  accounts  chiefly  for  the  chronic  ills  under 
which  the  farmers  suffer.  Between  these  extremes 
is  found  a  very  large  class  whose  discontent  is  real 
and  whose  feeling,  year  by  year,  grows  more  social- 
istic. I  tried  in  each  community  to  find  out  the  farmer 
whose  opinion  upon  such  subjects  was  thought  to  be 
of  value.  A  fair  summary  of  this  testimony  can  be 
put  into  the  experience  of  a  prosperous  farmer  whose 
intelligence  had  general  recognition  in  his  city.  I 
give  this,  as  nearly  word  for  word,  as  note-book 
memoranda  permit.  It  is  stated  at  length,  because 
the  illustration  is  believed  to  carry  more  truth  than 
any  mere  analysis  or  general  discussion. 

"  For  seventeen  years  I  lived  on  a  farm  out  of 
town.  For  nine  years  I  have  lived  in  the  city  and 
rented  my  farm.  I  have  got  ahead  a  little,  as  three- 
fourths  of  the  farmers  I  know  have  done,  if  they 
have  worked  hard  and  intelligently.  If  I  had  not 
read  two  books,  Henry  George,  in  the  early  eighties, 
and  later  Bellamy,  I  should  have  grubbed  along  and 
never  thought  anything  was  wrong.  Those  books 
set  me  thinking  how  the  things  we  grow  and  make 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  137 

are  divided  up.  I  have  read  ever  since,  and  gone  to 
a  good  many  lectures ;  but  what  influenced  me  most 
was  watching  and  finding  out  how  a  few  men  got 
very  rich,  and  a  large  number  amassed  fortunes  here 
in  town,  by  owning  and  running  the  street  cars. 
They  were,  many  of  them,  high  up  in  politics,  and 
got  the  streets  for  nothing,  and  then  from  year  to 
year  bought  up  the  most  valuable  pieces  of  land  in 
the  city,  because  they  knew  where  they  were  going 
to  put  down  the  tracks.  *I  was  in  a  position  to  know 
how  the  fat  contracts  —  building,  paving,  etc.  —  were 
put  out  so  as  to  strengthen  political  control,  which 
these  men  needed.  I  have  seen  a  contractor  grow 
wealthy  in  ten  years,  solely  because  he  could  manage 
politics  in  one  section  of  the  city.  The  corporation 
bought  him  in  this  way.  No  man  can  get  on  to  the 
city  council  if  those  men  do  not  want  him  there. 
The  town  has  grown  rapidly,  and  these  men  with 
their  friends  have  got  all  the  cream  while  we've  got 
the  skim  milk.  A  man  can't  die  on  skim  milk,  but 
you  don't  like  to  see  a  few  at  a  side  table  take  all  the 
cream.  They  tell  us  they  have  done  big  things  for 
the  city.  I  admit  it  is  true,  but  we  have  all  found 
out  here  how  the  clique  got  a  great  deal  more  out  of 
it  than  they  ought  to  get,  and  the  rest  of  the  town 
too  little.  At  the  start  nobody  knew  what  was  being 
given  away  in  parting  with  the  franchises.  The 
people  are  finding  out  their  mistake,  and  they  never 
will  be  quiet  till  they  have  got  them  again.  Now, 
when  I  understood  that  problem  in  my  town,  I  began 
to  reason  about  the  railroad  and  telegraph  system 
in  the  whole  country.  If  a  few  men  could  get  the 
cream  in  this  town,  it  was  easy  to  see  how  the  Goulds 


138  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

and  the  Huntingtons  could  do  it  in  a  much  bigger 
field. 

"  I  don't  doubt  they  have  helped  the  country  in  some 
ways,  just  as  the  street  cars  have  helped  this  town, 
but  in  both  cases  they  have  got  the  cream  and  the 
people  the  skim  milk.  Now,  nothing  will  make  me 
believe  that  there  isn't  some  way  of  doing  this  busi- 
ness—  that  is  as  much  public  business  as  it  is  private 
—  so  that  the  people  shall  get  fairer  treatment.  It 
is  thinking  about  these  things  that  made  me  join  first 
the  local  alliance  and,  later,  the  peoples  party,  be- 
cause they  are  trying  to  do  with  the  railroads  and 
certain  other  monopolies  what  we  in  this  town  pro- 
pose to  do  with  the  street  cars  and  the  electric  light." 

I  submit  this  case  as  fairly  representative,  enabling 
us  so  far  to  account  for  the  suspicion  and  restlessness 
that  make  this  phase  of  the  social  question.  It  is, 
of  course,  legitimate  to  challenge  his  remedy  of  pub- 
lic ownership.  We  cannot  deny  a  certain  justifica- 
tion to  his  sense  of  wrong.  As  he  felt  it,  millions  of 
others  have  come,  or  are  coming,  to  feel  it. 

The  form  in  which  the  farmer  has  stated  his  griev- 
ance has  often  been  so  muddled  that  any  economic 
tyro  could  make  easy  jest  of  it.  When  the  Irish 
farmers  began  to  agitate  against  landlords'  rent,  it 
was  just  as  easy  to  make  those  agitators  appear  very 
absurd.  All  the  economic  commonplaces  were  turned 
against  them  by  the  "  highest  authorities,"  as  well  as 
by  smart  writers  in  the  daily  press. 

As  we  now  look  upon  these  events  it  is  clear  that 
those  Irish  farmers  were  far  nearer  right  than  their 
patronizing  opponents.  The  farmer  was  paying  an 
amount  of  tribute  that  the  land  could  no  longer 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  139 

afford,  and  a  whole  body  of  the  most  socialistic  legis- 
lation in  modern  times  was  grudgingly  enacted. 

The  heart  of  the  protest  among  our  own  farmers 
may  in  time  look  far  more  intelligent  than  the  glib 
complacencies  which  the  "articulate  classes"  level 
against  them.  As  the  blade  of  economic  rent  cut  too 
far  into  the  loaf  of  the  Irish  farmer,  it  may  prove 
that  the  close  organization  of  railroad,  tide-water 
facilities,  the  stock  exchange,  and  the  great  banking 
filches  too  freely  from  the  farmers'  earnings. 

The  present  alliance  of  these  business  interests  is 
the  most  powerful  industrial  machine  that  the  world 
has  seen.  It  is  a  mechanism  that  gathers  to  itself 
every  triumph  of  science  and  invention.  Will  the 
financial  kings,  whose  colossal  ownership  enables 
them  to  control  and  direct  this  enginery,  use  it  so 
that  its  benefits  become  uniformly  apparent  to  the 
farming  class  ?  It  is  not  enough  that,  the  farmer  is 
kept  loyal  merely  through  the  "  curve  of  prosperity," 
his  confidence  must  have  sustaining  enough  to  keep 
his  loyalty  through  curves  of  depression.  The  farm- 
ers cannot  be  made  to  believe  that  the  unhappy  zig- 
zag between  fatness  and  leanness  is  wholly  due  to 
fickle  skies  and  occasional  bad  crops.  They  know 
enough  about  the  fatal  rhythm  of  the  crisis  and  its 
connection  with  gambling  distempers  in  the  market, 
to  protect  them  against  so  nafve  an  exposition.  They 
guess  as  giddily  at  the  real  source  of  crises  as  many 
of  the  men  who  write  books  upon  that  subject.  The 
farmer  may  nevertheless  be  right  in  attributing  one 
leading  cause  of  these  disturbances  to  the  way  in 
which  these  great  commercial  forces  are  used. 

That  the  canting  use  of  the  term  "  money  power  " 


140  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

has  become  an  offence,  ought  not  to  cozen  us  into 
the  belief  that  the  term  has  no  serious  meaning. 
The  centralizing  of  banking  and  transportation  with 
many  of  the  first  and  most  necessary  industries  is 
an  event  so  momentous  that  the  ablest  men  differ 
utterly  in  their  interpretation  of  it.  Is  this  money 
power,  as  now  directed  by  private  interest,  a  social 
menace  ? 

I  have  put  this  question  to  many  men  of  very  large 
experience.  Most  frequently  the  answers  are  opti- 
mistic, but  there  are  no  more  competent  witnesses  in 
this  country  than  a  large  number  of  men  who  look 
upon  this  same  "  money  power  "  with  the  gravest  mis- 
givings. They  will  state  these  doubts  more  freely  in 
private,  not  necessarily  from  cowardice,  but  from  hon- 
est intellectual  perplexity  before  the  practical  difficul- 
ties which  the  question  involves. 

I  can  condense  these  misgivings  in  the  opinions  of 
two  lawyers  with  princely  incomes  from  corporation 
practice.  Both  have  university  training  and  have 
written  books.  They  agreed  that  the  next  great  issue 
in  this  country  was  likely  to  be  with  the  money  power, 
defined  as  an  alliance  of  the  great  banking  with  vast 
businesses  which  have,  or  can  be  given,  the  character 
of  monopolies. 

I  showed  these  opinions  to  two  men,  a  banker  and 
a  trust  organizer.  One  has  a  national  reputation, 
the  other  is  frequently  quoted  in  conservative  dis- 
cussions of  finance.  Both  are  republicans  and  very 
prosperous.  I  do  no  injustice  to  their  views  in  say- 
ing that  they  were  still  more  pronounced  in  their 
fears  that  centralizing  financial  control  is  a  distinct 
social  danger. 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  141 

The  banker  said :  "  No  such  power  ever  fell  into 
human  hands  as  that  which  some  twenty-five  men 
now  hold.  I  do  not  believe  they  mean  to  abuse  it, 
but  I  do  not  see  how  they  can  continue  to  control 
it  so  that  it  shall  not  get  us  into  both  business  and 
political  difficulties." 

The  trust  organizer  said,  "The  next  thing  that 
will  be  recognized,  even  by  conservative  men,  is  the 
tyranny  in  this  country  of  this  money  power." 

I  do  not  put  upon  this  testimony  any  very  ominous 
interpretation.  It  may  prove  that  the  interests  of 
these  captains  of  industry  will  coincide  with  the  com- 
mon good.  My  object  in  quoting  the  above  views  is 
to  show  that  at  bottom  these  men  agree  with  what  is 
the  core  of  the  farmers'  discontent. 

It  would  be  fantastic  to  say  that  the  farmers  mean 
what  these  lawyers  and  the  bank  president  meant. 
The  latter  expressed  reasoned  opinions,  based  upon 
long  and  detailed  experience  with  financial  affairs. 
They  may  be  said  to  see  as  far  as  any  one  sees  into 
the  problem  of  commercial  organization.  They  have 
at  least  some  conception  of  the  obscure  relations  in 
which  banking,  transportation,  and  certain  great  in- 
dustries stand  to  each  other.  Far  less  of  this  is 
understood  by  the  farmer.  His  error  has  been  ex- 
pressed in  such  ways  as  to  cast  suspicion  or  contempt 
upon  the  party  as  a  whole.  The  injustice  of  this 
against  the  peoples  party  is  flagrant.  Beneath  all 
errors  of  conscious  explanation  may  still  be  found  an 
instinct  that  is  sound  and  right.  Skilful  dialectic  and 
literary  good  form  may  as  easily  win  a  bad  case,  as 
ignorant  handling  may  lose  a  good  one.  From  this 
cause  the  farmers'  movement  has  suffered.  Its  most 


142  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

strident  emphasis  has  too  often  been  upon  the  wrong 
issue.  Many  of  its  most  hopeful  proposals  have  been 
obscured  by  irrelevancies,  or  so  stated  as  to  carry  no 
conviction. 

What  any  fair  critic  may  already  see  behind  the 
faulty  presentation  of  populism,  is  that  the  moving  pur- 
pose of  it  is  closely  akin  to  that  just  considered  under 
"  General  Opinion  "  and  under  "  Trade  Unions."  If 
carefully  studied,  the  doubts  and  suspicions  of  the 
populist  are  seen  to  be  strangely  like  the  doubts 
and  suspicions  of  the  two  lawyers  and  the  bank 
president.  The  ignorant  and  the  less  ignorant  agree 
that  the  "money  power"  is  full  of  threatening. 
Both  agree  that  some  form  and  measure  of  strong 
government  or  state  control  will  be  a  necessity  of  the 
future.  They  agree  that  these  gathered  forces  have 
grown  too  powerful  to  be  left  unregulated  in  private 
hands.  The  farmer's  feeling  about  this  is  no  less 
justified  because  he  cannot  give  rational  account  of 
it.  The  banker  and  lawyer  could  state  more  cogently 
what  they  meant  by  the  "  money  power,"  yet,  if  there 
were  any  truth  in  their  opinions,  it  is  not  at  bottom 
truer  than  the  feeling  of  the  populist. 

As  with  general  opinion,  as  with  the  opinion  of 
the  trade  union,  so  the  feeling  of  discontent  in  this 
farmers'  movement  is  one  against  monopoly  privilege. 
It  is  being  found  out  what  the  heart  of  this  privilege 
is.  It  inheres  in  certain  forms  of  property  owner- 
ship. It  is  the  holding  in  such  unrestricted  private 
possession  the  very  conditions  and  instruments  of 
wealth  production. 

To  gain  mastery  over  the  very  titbits  of  the  earth, 
in  harbors,  cities,  highways,  and  mines,  and  then  to 


THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION  143 

own  enough  of  the  great  machinery  of  transportation 
and  production  to  decide  the  conditions  under  which 
others  shall  do  their  work  —  this  is  the  power  against 
which  a  dangerously  large  number  of  people  is  crying 
out.  They  do  not  see  how  power,  in  this  degree  and 
kind,  can  continue  to  grow,  without  abandoning  every 
hope  of  a  society  in  which  equal  privilege  shall  at  last 
reign  among  men. 

The  economic  significance  of  the  social  question 
is  this  deepening  purpose  to  break  the  hold  upon 
monopoly  privilege,  as  above  denned.  Rightly  or 
wrongly  it  has  come  to  be  believed,  by  numbers  great 
enough  to  become  a  social  and  political  force,  that  the 
most  vital  landholdings  and  the  great  machinery  are 
not  now  used  for  the  greatest  common  good. 

Yet  the  purely  business  elements  are  probably  not 
first  in  this  rising  tide  of  disapproval.  There  is  a 
growing  conviction  that  private  ownership  may  gather 
to  itself  such  strength  and  mastery  as  to  control  poli- 
tics and  defeat  the  very  beginnings  of  democratic 
government. 

It  has  thus  come  to  pass  that  the  seeds  of  political 
abuse  which  capitalism  itself  planted  are  bearing  fruit. 
Socialism  and  organized  labor,  imbued  with  the  collec- 
tivist  spirit,  have  learned  their  lesson.  There  is  in 
future  no  divorcing  of  the  greater  labor  disturbances 
from  politics. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   INEVITABLENESS   OF   THE   SOCIAL   QUESTION 

A  VETERAN  in  the  trade-union  movement  of  Massa- 
chusetts said  at  a  dinner  of  the  Twentieth  Century 
Club  :  "  We  have  not  got  very  far  in  understanding 
the  social  question  until  we  rise  out  of  the  atmosphere 
of  personal  blaming.  A  man  who  thinks  it  is  all  the 
fault  of  this  or  that  capitalist,  has  not  got  very 
far.  Our  real  trouble  is  not  with  specific  rich  men, 
but  with  the  general  system  which  makes  possi- 
ble the  man  of  one  hundred  millions  on  one  side,  and 
a  mass  of  laborers  struggling  for  the  means  of  sub- 
sistence on  the  other.  It  is  not  primarily  the  fault  of 
the  magnates ;  it  is  the  fault  of  all  of  us  who  consent 
to  the  conditions  out  of  which  these  dangerous  extremes 
spring  up." 

A  member  of  the  London  County  Council,  making 
investigations  in  the  United  States,  heard  these  words, 
and  added :  "  I  have  been  interviewing  your  business 
men  ever  since  I  landed,  but  not  once  have  I  heard 
so  impersonal  a  judgment.  I  have  found  the  pick  of 
your  labor  leaders  far  better  instructed  upon  all  sides 
of  the  labor  controversy  than  business  men.  The 
business  man  is  cocksure  about  the  trouble.  It  is 
the  labor  agitator.  If  only  he  could  be  suppressed, 
all  would  be  well."  His  explanation  was  that  men  of 
affairs  were  too  busy  to  read.  They  were  simply  vexed 

144 


THE  INEVITABLENESS   OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     145 

by  strikes  and  by  trade-union  interference,  and  out  of 
this  immediate  experience  made  their  philosophy. 

This  is  a  very  insufficient  analysis.  These  large  and 
impersonal  views  are  exceptions  upon  both  sides,  but 
they  are  as  frequently  met  among  business  men  as  among 
those  who  represent  labor.  The  perpetual  astonishment 
of  the  student  is,  however,  that  business  men  know  so 
little  of  those  organs  of  opinion  into  which  the  wage 
earner  puts  his  most  earnest  and  most  honest  thought. 
It  is  droll  that  one  should  have  to  make  this  comment, 
but  I  have  never  yet  seen  an  employer  who  had  given 
the  least  serious  attention  to  this  literature.  I  have 
known  a  manufacturer  of  machinery  who  had  been 
through  repeated  conflicts  with  his  men  over  ques- 
tions raised  by  the  union.  He  did  not  treat  these 
disturbances  as  mere  perversity.  He  had  read  much 
general  labor  literature  and  showed  some  pride  in 
admitting  that  "  great  changes  were  certain  to  occur 
between  labor  and  capital  during  the  next  generation." 
Yet  among  the  men  in  his  own  business,  a  trade  jour- 
nal had  been  printed  month  by  month  for  several 
years.  In  the  successive  issues,  every  point  of  dif- 
ference between  his  own  views  and  those  of  his 
men  had  been  repeatedly  discussed.  All  that  his 
men  hoped  for  and  were  trying  to  attain,  was  here 
set  down,  yet  this  employer  had  never  thought  it 
worth  his  while  to  read  a  line  of  it.  His  intellectual 
curiosity  led  him  to  much  study  of  popular  sociological 
books,  but  schemes  for  improvements  fermenting  in 
the  minds  of  his  own  workers  had  interested  him  so 
little  that  in  his  own  words,  "  It  never  occurred  to  me 
that  there  was  anything  worth  reading  in  the  journal 
of  these  mechanics." 


146  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

I  have  known  intelligent  builders  and  scholarly 
architects  who  had  long  fought  trade  unions  among 
their  own  workmen  and  yet  had  never  even  heard  of 
the  trade  journals  in  these  crafts.  These  have  con- 
tained for  many  years  the  opinions  of  these  workers 
upon  every  issue  that  enters  into  their  relation  to  the 
employers.  Cigar  makers  and  garment  workers  are 
thought  to  rank  lower  in  the  scale,  yet  no  one  can 
look  through  a  batch  of  their  trade  organs  without  a 
wholly  new  conception  of  the  movements  there  repre- 
sented. As  religious  bodies,  political  parties,  and 
business  interests  have  their  own  press  for  propa- 
ganda, so  that  part  of  the  labor  world,  from  which 
the  chief  industrial  resistance  comes,  has  created  an 
extensive  periodical  literature  far  abler  than  is  com- 
monly believed.  In  this  literature  they  discuss  not 
only  the  conditions  under  which  they  work,  —  hours, 
wages,  machinery,  strikes,  trade  unions,  —  they  also 
discuss  every  phase  of  the  competitive  regime  under 
which  the  industrial  struggle  for  existence  goes  on. 
From  his  employers  and  those  who  think  with  them, 
the  workman  hears  the  defence  of  this  competitive 
struggle.  He  is  told  that  under  it  men  find  their 
place  according  to  their  merit.  "Talent  and  efficiency 
get  their  reward,  mediocrity  sinks  to  its  proper  level." 
He  is  told  that  in  all  wealth-making  three  factors  are 
essential,  land,  labor,  and  capital,  or,  by  more  recent 
refinement,  ''natural  opportunity,  labor,  and  directing 
intelligence."  Each,  according  to  the  service  it  ren- 
ders, receives  its  portion  of  the  product :  land  its  rent, 
labor  its  wage,  and  organizing  management  its  profits. 
He  is  assured  that  this  triune  relation  has  something  of 
the  sanctity  of  a  divine  decree,  or  at  least  the  authority 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     147 

of  a  natural  law.  Given  a  reign  of  "  free  contract," 
and  a  proper  regard  for  competition,  and  industrially 
the  best  possible  world  is  at  hand,  especially  for  the 
wage  earner.  The  forces  of  distribution  give  him  an 
ever  increasing  part  of  the  product,  while  capital  secures 
a  relatively  diminishing  portion.  This  is  the  cheerful 
formula. 

Meantime  the  victim  of  this  instruction  is  busy  with 
his  own  observations.  He  notes  that  the  capitalist 
class  enlarges  its  expenditure  at  a  quite  dizzying  pace. 
The  home,  the  equipage,  the  club,  the  sports  and  rec- 
reation, expand  each  year  into  more  lavish  and  prod- 
igal form.  It  is  very  apparent  that  dollar  for  dollar 
the  interest  on  capital  has  fallen  from  a  high  to  a  low 
figure.  It  is  apparent  that  dollar  for  dollar  profits 
have  in  the  majority  of  businesses  also  fallen,  but 
the  belectured  wage  earner  sees  that  this  jocund 
formula  is  modified  not  a  little  by  the  simple  fact 
that  the  capitalist,  during  this  fall  in  profits  and 
interest,  may  somehow  have  doubled  and  redoubled 
his  thrifty  gains.  If  one  possess  four  or  five  times 
more  capital,  his  income  swells  though  the  rate  of 
interest  and  profit  falls.  The  laborer  is  not,  how- 
ever, left  alone  with  his  doubts.  The  world  is  full 
of  very  wise  people,  who  tell  him  with  great  frank- 
ness that  labor  does  not  in  any  sense  get  its  fair 
share.  They  tell  him  that  through  the  manipulating 
of  a  thousand  chartered  privileges,  labor  is  defrauded 
of  a  formidable  portion  of  its  product.  There  are 
no  abler  economists  than  dozens  who  make  this 
declaration. 

As  for  the  competitive  wage  system  with  its  "  free 
contract,"  a  troop  of  eminent  men  denounce  it  in 


148  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

unmeasured  terms.  They  denounce  it  economically, 
because  of  its  wastefulness  through  unnecessary 
duplication  of  rival  plants,  with  the  orgy  of  advertis- 
ing which  this  rivalry  occasions.  They  denounce  it 
morally  with  even  more  confident  disapproval.  They 
see  in  it  the  teeming  source  of  the  self-seeking  which 
delights  to  take  every  advantage  of  another's  weakness 
or  ignorance,  to  "best"  him  in  the  bargain.  They 
see  in  it  the  chief  stimulator  of  the  universal  hunger 
for  quick  riches  which  spreads  among  us  the  methods 
and  the  spirit  of  the  gambler.  They  charge  it  with 
setting  such  a  premium  upon  mere  sharpness  and 
cunning  that  this  type  of  success  becomes  the  attrac- 
tive idol  for  general  worship. 

It  is  easy  to  convict  these  charges  of  exaggeration 
in  the  sense  that  they  ignore  the  positive  and  service- 
able side  of  competition.  It  is  not  easy  to  deny  that 
they  carry  with  them  a  disquieting  truth.  It  is  upon 
this,  and  not  upon  the  shaded  qualifications,  that  the 
disaffected  workmen  seize.  The  speculative  portions 
of  the  labor  press  have  become  the  receptacle  of  the 
most  accusing  criticism  against  the  business  world  as 
now  managed  —  a  criticism  drawn  not  from  the  ranks 
of  labor,  but  from  the  ranks  of  those  who  possess  as 
much  enlightenment  as  modern  culture  and  opportu- 
nity usually  give. 

Few  events  during  recent  years  have  more  signifi- 
cance than  the  growing  popular  sympathy  with  labor 
unions  in  these  struggles,  especially  their  struggles 
with  semi-public  corporations.  This  sympathy  has 
had  an  almost  universal  expression  in  the  recent 
anthracite  coal  strike.  But  for  the  unhappy  fatalities 
of  personal  violence  that  break  out  in  the  later  despair- 


THE   1NEVITABLENESS  OF  THE   SOCIAL  QUESTION     149 

ing  days  of  the  strike,  this  public  sympathy  would 
become  irresistible.  The  wholesome  popular  instinct 
for  law  and  order  is  swift  to  react  against  any  excess 
of  ruffianly  attack  upon  persons  and  property.  The 
strike  breaks  when  this  deviltry  becomes  unmanage- 
able. At  this  point  every  strong  current  of  general 
sympathy  deserts  the  strikers.  Even  for  them  it  is 
better  that  it  should  be  so,  for  to  win  by  lawlessness 
would  bring  weakness  and  not  strength  to  labor. 

This  fact  carries  in  it,  however,  tragedy  and  pathos 
alike.  Labor  leaders  have  learned  that  they  cannot 
and  ought  not  to  succeed  by  personal  savagery  against 
property  or  persons.  I  have  never  heard  more  hon- 
est and  passionate  pleading  for  law  and  order  than 
from  trade-union  officials  addressing  their  own  men 
in  time  of  strike.  At  such  a  moment  John  Mitchell 
said  to  his  miners  :  "  If  you  want  to  spoil  your  own 
cause  and  lose  every  sacrifice  you  have  made  for 
yourselves  and  your  families,  give  way  to  your  tem- 
per and  commit  some  violence.  Just  a  few  outbreaks 
like  this  and  the  public  good-will,  to  which  we  must 
look  in  last  resort,  will  fail  us  and  we  shall  deserve 
to  lose  it."  These  words  were  not  spoken  for  out- 
side use,  but  to  his  own  men  in  council.  Nor  are 
they  exceptional  among  the  more  disciplined  leaders 
in  this  country.  Yet  what,  meantime,  do  these 
leaders  and  their  fellows  also  know  ?  They  know 
that  many  of  these  corporations  against  which  their 
fight  is  carried  on  have  been  more  dangerously  law- 
less than  can  be  any  crude  act  which  their  own  mem- 
bers are  likely  to  commit.  They  know  this  because 
scores  of  the  best-known  men  in  the  United  States 
have  told  them  so.  They  have  read  it  in  half  the 


I5O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

great  papers,  in  books,  in  economic  studies,  and  hun- 
dreds of  times  have  laid  these  opinions  before  their 
members  in  the  labor  press.  Dr.  Gladden,  lecturing 
this  year  before  Yale  students,  speaks  in  these  words 
of  the  partnership  between  the  politician  and  the  con- 
senting managers  of  certain  corporations  : J  — 

"  There  is  no  man  in  any  prison  in  this  country  who 
has  done  a  hundredth  part  as  much  to  make  society 
impossible  as  has  been  done  by  any  one  of  half  a 
dozen  great  political  leaders.  The  man  who  by  the 
corrupt  use  of  money  manipulates  caucuses  and  con- 
ventions, and  debauches  candidates  and  voters,  thus 
poisoning  at  their  sources  the  streams  of  political 
power,  is  the  most  dangerous  man  in  society  to-day, 
albeit  his  guilt  is  shared  by  those  managers  of  great 
corporations  who  furnish  him  with  corruption  funds. 
If  our  notions  of  justice  were  clearer,  such  men  would 
not  be  abroad  in  society.  Compared  with  the  de- 
structive influence  of  such  men,  how  harmless  are 
most  of  the  criminals  shut  up  in  our  prisons." 

Which  is  worse,  to  slug  a  fellow-workman  or  to 
purchase  some  immunity  for  a  corporation  by  paying 
large  sums  to  the  local  political  "boss,"  knowing  well 
what  this  means  for  lawless  and  debasing  effect  at 
the  very  heart  of  our  political  life?  This  is  but  a 
single  form  that  this  corporate  lawlessness  takes  on, 
and  it  would  be  very  inane  to  infer  that  this  greater 
wrong  justifies  the  lesser  wrong  of  the  trade  union. 
The  two  wrongs  are  brought  together  to  show  the  kind 
of  bitterness  which  thousands  of  the  trade  unionists 
are  coming  to  feel  when  they  are  held  so  rigidly  to  law 
and  order,  while  these  greater  fellow-criminals  escape. 

1  "  Social  Salvation,"  p.  105. 


THE   INEVITABLENESS   OF  THE   SOCIAL   QUESTION     151 

Another  form  of  unfairness  that  is  still  less  ex- 
cusable is  the  popular  explanation  of  the  cause  and 
continuance  of  many  labor  troubles.  We  are  gravely 
assured  that  it  is  the  "  labor  agitator  "  —  the  "walking- 
delegate."  In  half  the  papers  of  the  country  this 
sorry  illusion  gets  repeated  from  year  to  year,  until  it 
is  believed. 

I  met  a  little  girl  much  agitated,  in  Pullman,  after 
the  great  strike  there.  I  asked  her  what  the  strike 
was  about.  She  answered,  "  Oh,  the  workmen  wanted 
to  have  their  rents  put  up,  and  Mr.  Pullman  wouldn't 
do  it."  There  is  nothing  funnier  in  this  child's  ex- 
position than  in  that  generalization  under  which  the 
walking-delegate  is  naively  written  down  as  the  cause 
of  strikes.  For  trade  unionism  at  large  in  the  United 
States,  the  walking-delegate  represents  the  opinion 
and  will  of  his  union  more  closely  than  most  con- 
gressmen represent  the  opinion  and  will  of  their 
constituents. 

We  are  sufficiently  reminded  that  our  best  men  will 
not  go  into  the  smaller  politics.  It  is  at  least  as  true 
that  the  best  labor  men  do  not  always  get  prominent 
positions  in  the  unions,  and  essentially  for  the  same 
reason.  The  kind  of  gift  that  is  indispensable  — 
fluent  speech,  for  example  —  to  active,  stirring  leader- 
ship is  oftener  found  among  men  of  lighter  weight. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  are  no  cooler  or  steadier 
heads  in  the  labor  movement  than  many  of  those  who 
now  control  the  unions  in  this  country. 

But  the  ends  of  capitalistic  politics  are  in  no  way 
more  admirably  served,  than  by  fixing  the  cause  of 
these  wasteful  and  annoying  troubles  definitely  upon 
obnoxious  individuals.  During  one  of  our  severest 


152  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

coal  strikes,  in  which  the  public  showed  much  sym- 
pathy with  the  miners,  an  editorial  appeared  in  one 
of  our  best  papers,  saying  that  the  causes  were  very 
obscure,  that  more  light  was  needed  for  fair  judg- 
ment I  showed  this  to  an  operator  in  the  thick  of 
the  fight,  urging  that  the  public  have  a  fuller  account 
of  the  issues  in  dispute.  He  replied  that  there  were 
no  issues,  "  It's  all  the  work  of  two  or  three  labor 
fakirs  who  want  to  live  off  our  men."  "  What  makes 
me  mad,"  he  added,  "is  that  I  saw  the  manager  of 
that  paper  and  gave  him  the  facts,  and  now  the 
damned  fool  must  talk  about  obscure  causes  and  the 
need  of  light." 

The  leisure  of  a  few  evenings  spent  with  the  files 
of  a  dozen  of  our  better  labor  papers  will  leave  no 
doubt  in  the  mind  of  any  candid  reader  that  all  these 
unfair  strictures  against  the  unions  produce  most 
regrettable  effects.  They  are  interpreted  to  mean 
that  the  critics  of  the  labor  movement  are  wilfully 
ignorant  of  its  chief  purposes,  or  deliberately  mali- 
cious in  characterizing  its  efforts. 

The  labor  movement  rests  on  the  assumption  that 
the  production  and  distribution  of  wealth,  as  now 
managed,  ought  to  be  and  can  be  so  far  changed, 
as  to  give  the  laborer  more  power  in  deciding  the 
terms  under  which  he  works.  It  is  because  increas- 
ing numbers  of  the  wage  earners  are  becoming  con- 
vinced upon  this  point  that  society  is  afflicted  with 
an  almost  unbroken  series  of  costly  labor  disputes. 
This  warfare  excites  caustic  comments  from  the  well- 
to-do,  as  if  it  were  the  deliberate  perversity  of  churlish 
men. 

Yet  in  a  long  and  embittered  strike  no  one  bears  so 


THE   INEVITABLENESS   OF  THE   SOCIAL   QUESTION     153 

heavy  a  burden  as  the  striker  and  his  family.  There 
is  no  more  poignant  tragedy  than  the  freely  accepted 
suffering  which  thousands  of  fathers  and  mothers 
will  undergo  during  the  wasting  months  of  a  strike. 
With  children  to  feed,  these  parents  know  all  that  it 
means  to  have  every  cent  of  income  stopped  for  an 
indefinite  future.  They  know  that  the  little  luxuries 
must  disappear,  that  the  petty  saving  must  be  quickly 
spent,  and  a  plague  of  debts  at  once  begin.  They 
know  all  this,  not  as  a  curious  observation,  but  as 
grievous  human  experience.  They  know  it,  and  yet 
freely  choose  to  suffer  every  sacrifice  that  the  event 
carries  with  it. 

We  are  told  by  their  critics  that  they  would  not 
commit  such  follies  but  for  the  exercise  of  tyranny 
and  compulsion.  Yes,  the  trade  union  exercises  the 
tyranny  and  compulsion  of  a  majority  vote  as  we  do 
generally  in  our  form  of  government.  The  other 
sagacious  charge,  that  they  are  duped  into  the  hard- 
ships of  a  strike  by  their  own  officials,  is  generally  so 
far  from  the  fact  that  the  officials  know  better  than  all 
others  that  their  own  pay  is  likely  to  stop  in  a  prolonged 
dispute,  and  if  it  fail,  their  prestige  is  at  an  end.  It 
is  the  clear  knowledge  of  this  fact  which  leads  trade- 
union  officials  every  year  to  check  hundreds  of  strikes, 
of  which  the  public  knows  nothing.  What  is  brought 
to  the  public  ear  is  the  most  flagrant  abuses  of  trade- 
union  activity.  Especially  in  cities  that  are  politically 
corrupt,  trade-union  officials  too  often  take  on  the 
local  color.  They  know  and  practise  every  trick 
from  which  the  common  municipal  life  suffers. 

The  dishonest  trade-union  official,  the  mere  talker, 
the  fakir  proper  —  these  are  all  a  part  of  the  heavy 


154  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

burden  that  organized  labor  has  to  bear.  It  knows 
these  men  better  than  the  public  knows  them,  knows 
their  weaknesses  often  better  than  the  employer 
knows  them.  I  once  thought  myself  doing  a  service 
to  a  trade  union,  by  telling  some  trustworthy  members 
that  their  leader  was  in  the  pay  of  an  association  of 
employers.  They  had  bought  him  for  the  purpose 
of  "keeping  the  union  quiet."  I  found  that  the 
strong  men  in  the  union  were  perfectly  familiar  with 
the  fact,  but  it  was  more  than  three  years  before 
they  could  rid  themselves  of  this  man. 

The  "  cause "  yet  means  so  much  to  them  that 
hard-worked  men  with  meagre  income  will  give  time 
and  strength  and  money,  not  spasmodically,  but  year 
after  year,  in  order  that  their  group  welfare  may  not 
surfer.  The  sacrifices  are  great,  and  they  are  unre- 
mitting. The  common  fund  which  it  has  required 
years  to  gather,  is  swept  away  in  the  strike  of  a  few 
weeks.  Money  that  is  destined  for  burial  or  sick 
benefit  often  goes  with  the  rest. 

Do  multitudes  of  men  continue  to  load  themselves 
with  these  heavy  encumbrances,  except  for  reasons 
that  in  their  minds  bear  some  relation  to  the  sacrifices 
involved  ?  The  struggle  is  as  widespread  as  it  is 
persistent.  Without  exception  this  struggle  assumes 
that  the  present  competitive  wage  system  does  not 
bring  justice  to  labor.  The  revolt  of  the  strike,  the 
friction,  the  angry  pressure  of  organized  labor,  stand 
for  a  protest  against  this  system.  The  mass  of 
labor  disturbances  is  the  measure  of  dissatisfaction 
with  it. 

Now  it  happens  that  our  society  is  full  of  extremely 
influential  persons  who  say  point-blank  that  labor's 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     155 

protest  is  in  the  main  a  righteous  one  that  should 
prevail.  This  sympathetic  assent  adds,  year  by  year, 
new  power  to  the  labor  and  socialistic  movement. 
The  workman  no  longer  reads  in  his  own  papers 
merely  the  opinions  of  his  mates,  he  reads  there  the 
opinions  of  so  many  of  the  world's  intellectual  leaders, 
that  he  naturally  comes  to  believe  that  the  highest 
and  most  disinterested  talent  is  on  his  side  in  the 
struggle.1 

My  attention  was  first  called  to  the  real  character 
of  this  influence  by  the  use  to  which  German  labor 
papers  put  many  of  the  leading  writers  in  that  coun- 
try. The  philosopher  F.  A.  Lange  wrote  his  epoch- 
making  book  on  the  labor  question  in  the  days  when 
social  democracy  in  Germany  was  in  the  first  ferment 
of  political  organization.  The  moral  weakness  of 
the  competitive  system,  the  nature  of  the  industrial 
struggle  for  existence,  the  defeat  of  higher  ideal  values 
in  this  scramble  for  private  gain,  never  at  that  time 
had  been  told  with  such  searching  power  as  by  this 
noble  scholar.  German  workingmen  were  among 
the  first  to  welcome  it.  They  lectured  upon  it,  wrote 
about  it,  and  reproduced  it  in  their  literature.  "  Here, 
at  last,"  they  said,  "  is  a  university  teacher  in  great 
vogue,  who  understands  what  our  struggle  means  and 
has  the  courage  to  utter  it." 

From  this  volume  ("  Die  Arbeiter  Frage  ")  the  more 
thoughtful  socialists  were  led  to  Professor  Lange's 
greater  work,  "  The  History  of  Materialism,"  in  which 
they  found  a  mine  of  critical  material.  The  disci- 

1  The  mass  of  laborers  even  in  trade  unions  are  not  habitual  readers, 
but  these  thoughts  in  the  speeches  of  their  fellows  or  in  conversation 
with  those  who  do  read,  become  a  part  of  th'eir  life. 


156  THE  SOCIAL   UNREST 

plined  interest  which  Lange  always  took  in  economic 
studies,  heightens  his  value  for  their  uses.  This 
more  academic  study  also  bristles  with  barbed  para- 
graphs against  the  present  industrial  regime.  In 
the  chapter  on  "  Political  Economy  and  Dogmatic 
Egoism "  the  author  analyzes  the  prevailing  apol- 
ogies for  the  struggle  for  existence  as  it  appears 
in  modern  business.  He  finds  in  it  a  deification  of 
self-interest  that  stands  in  deadly  enmity  with  ethical 
idealism. 

He  says :  "  We  may  show  a  hundred  times  that  with 
the  success  of  speculation  and  great  capitalists  the 
position  of  everybody  else,  step  by  step,  improves ; 
but  so  long  as  it  is  true  that  with  every  step  of  this 
improvement  the  difference  in  the  position  of  indi- 
viduals and  in  the  means  for  further  advancement 
also  grows,  so  long  will  each  step  of  this  movement 
lead  toward  a  turning-point  where  the  wealth  and 
power  of  individuals  break  down  all  the  barriers  of 
law  and  morals,  and  a  degraded  proletariat  serves  as 
a  football  to  the  passions  of  the  few,  until  at  last  every- 
thing ends  in  a  social  earthquake  which  swallows 
up  the  artificial  edifice  of  one-sided  and  selfish  inter- 
ests. .  .  .  The  state  becomes  venal.  The  hope- 
lessly poor  will  just  as  easily  hate  the  law  as  the 
over-rich  despise  it.  Sparta  perished  when  the 
whole  land  of  the  country  belonged  to  a  hundred 
families;  Rome  when  a  proletariat  of  millions  stood 
opposed  to  a  few  thousands  of  proprietors,  whose 
resources  were  so  enormous  that  Crassus  considered 
no  one  rich  who  could  not  maintain  an  army  at  his 
own  expense.  ...  In  mediaeval  Italy  also  popular 
freedom  was  lost  through  a  moneyed  oligarchy  and  a 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     157 

proletariat.  ...  It  is  characteristic  that  in  Florence 
the  richest  banker  finally  became  an  unlimited  despot, 
and  that  contemporaneously  in  Genoa  the  Bank  of 
St.  George  in  a  measure  absorbed  the  state.  " 

He  opens  his  chapter  on  Christianity  and  En- 
lightenment in  these  words :  "  The  present  state  of 
things  has  been  frequently  compared  with  that  of  the 
ancient  world  before  its  dissolution,  and  it  cannot  be 
denied  that  significant  analogies  present  themselves. 
We  have  the  immoderate  growth  of  riches,  we  have 
the  proletariat,  we  have  the  decay  of  morals  and 
religion ;  the  present  forms  of  government  all  have 
their  existence  threatened,  and  the  belief  in  a  coming 
general  and  mighty  revolution  is  widely  spread  and 
deeply  rooted." 

As  the  name  of  the  musician  Wagner  rose  in  distinc- 
tion, the  socialist  did  not  forget  to  rifle  his  "  Kunst 
und  die  Revolution"  for  comforting  opinions.  "Art 
and  the  Revolution  "  is  one  fierce  anathema.  That 
the  laborers  should  rise  against  commercialism  is  the 
one  sign  to  this  "  poet-musician  "  that  they  have  self- 
respect  and  intelligence.  "This  hatred,"  he  says, 
"  springs  from  a  noble  instinct  for  a  dignified  joy  in 
life ;  from  the  passion  to  rise  from  drudgery  to  art, 
from  slavery  to  free  humanity."  It  is  passages  like 
these  that  gave  Wagner  the  title,  "  The  Karl  Marx 
of  poetry  and  music." 

From  the  weighty  books  of  Dr.  Schaeffle  they 
took  very  early  such  utterances  as  these :  "  The  un- 
limited sway  of  capitalism  offers  a  widespread  and 
fruitful  field  for  the  growth  of  immoral  instincts," 
"  The  factory  system  has  come  with  its  merciless 
exploitation  of  wage  labor." 


158  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

During  a  later  visit  to  Germany,  I  came  to  know  a 
socialist  workingman  with  whom  I  often  argued  about 
the  rights  and  wrongs  of  the  "present  system."  When 
the  discussion  once  turned  upon  a  question  of  author- 
ity and  opinion,  he  took  from  his  desk  a  scrap-book 
filled  with  clippings  from  German  labor  papers.  These 
were  passages  condemning  the  industrial  system  as 
it  now  exists.  With  every  degree  of  vehemence,  the 
writers  declared  that  labor  was  unjustly  treated ;  that 
the  wage  system  had  much  in  it  common  with  slavery ; 
that  capitalism  was  full  of  intolerable  tyrannies.  I 
do  not  say  these  opinions  were  either  wise  or  true. 
I  use  them  to  show  how  surely  they  brought  this 
mechanic  to  feel  that  his  own  views  were  justified, 
and  had  the  approval  of  the  masters  of  thought.  His 
authorities  were  not  merely  the  mordant  cynicism  of 
Heine  or  the  rhymed  hatred  of  Freiligrath.  He 
had  the  censure  he  wanted  from  half  the  German 
economists.  He  had  made  excerpts  from  the  first 
of  German  historians,  like  the  following  from 
Mommsen. 

"  Riches  and  misery  in  close  league  drove  the 
Italians  out  of  Italy  and  filled  the  peninsula  partly 
with  swarms  of  slaves,  partly  with  awful  silence.  It 
is  a  terrible  picture,  but  not  one  peculiar  to  Italy; 
whenever  the  government  of  capitalists  in  a  slave 
state  has  fully  developed  itself,  it  has  desolated 
God's  fair  world  in  the  same  way.  .  .  .  All  the 
arrant  sins  that  capital  has  been  guilty  of  against 
nation  and  civilization  in  the  modern  world  remain  as 
far  inferior  to  the  abomination  of  the  ancient  capital- 
ist states  as  the  free  man,  be  he  ever  so  poor,  remains 
superior  to  the  slave ;  and  not  until  the  dragon  seed 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     159 

of  North  America  ripens  will  the  world  have  again 
similar  fruits  to  reap."  1 

He  had  cut  out  the  views  of  Tolstoi,  of  Ibsen,  of 
Ruskin,  of  Carlyle.  He  turned  upon  me  in  triumph, 
saying:  "If  it  is  a  question  of  opinion  about  our 
cursed  society,  all  the  men  who  think  great  thoughts, 
and  dare  to  utter  them,  are  with  us.  They  all  call  it 
rotten,  they  despise  capitalism,  the  politicians,  and  the 
lawyers  that  are  its  hirelings." 

Few  will  be  so  unfair  as  to  deny  that  this  artisan 
got  his  impressions  as  honestly  as  impressions  come 
to  most  of  us.  It  will  be  admitted  that  his  feelings 
were  stoutly  reenforced  by  the  conviction  that  these 
men  of  learning  were  on  his  side.  He  was  not  likely 
to  make  nice  discrimination  as  to  the  relation  of  these 
extracts  to  the  author's  completer  thought.  This 
discrimination  is  rare  even  among  the  educated. 
The  poets,  thinkers,  scholars,  clothed  this  saw-filer's 
rougher  thought  in  the  purple  of  their  own  distinc- 
tion. They  brought  to  him  the  mysterious  sanction 
of  those  whom  we  all  recognize  as  teachers.  What 
he  and  his  kind  could  only  feel  or  poorly  utter,  they 
gave  back  to  him  in  splendid  or  rugged  phrases  that 
redoubled  their  force  and  made  them  sacred  to  his 
imagination.  If,  then,  this  incident  be  multiplied 
million-fold,  we  get  new  insight  into  one  source  of 
unrest  with  the  present  social  order. 

My  experience  with  this  German  workingman  led 

1  This  man  was  proud  of  having  learned  French  enough  to  read 
Victor  Hugo.  He  had  taken  from  "  Les  Miserables  "  these  radical  words, 
"  Universaliser  la  propriete  (ce  qui  est  le  contraire  de  Pabolir)  en  sup- 
primant  le  parasitisme  social,  c'est  a  dire  arriver  a  ce  but :  tout  homme 
proprietaire  et  aucun  homme  maitre,  voila  pour  moi  la  veritable  Econo- 
mic sociale  et  politique." 


160  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

me  to  collect  several  hundred  copies  of  European 
labor  journals,  popular  pamphlets,  and  leaflets.  They 
present  a  kind  of  anthology  filled  with  telling  quota- 
tions against  the  economic  organization  of  society. 
A  corresponding  collection  of  our  own  labor  literature 
in  1890  showed  less  systematic  use  of  such  criticisms, 
but  this  difference  has  now  wholly  disappeared.  Even 
our  more  special  trade  organs  are  not  less  alert  to 
welcome  imposing  authorities.  Emerson,  as  in  the 
following  passage,  is  put  to  constant  use :  "  As  long 
as  our  civilization  is  one  of  property,  of  fences,  of 
exclusiveness,  it  will  be  mocked  by  delusions.  Our 
riches  will  leave  us  sick,  there  will  be  bitterness  in 
our  laughter,  and  our  wine  will  burn  our  mouth. 
Only  that  good  profits  which  we  can  taste  with  all 
doors  open  and  which  serves  all  men."  Matthew 
Arnold's  famous  phrase  does  perpetual  service, 
"  Our  present  social  inequality  materializes  the  upper 
class,  vulgarizes  the  middle  class,  and  brutalizes  the 
lower  class."  Even  from  the  elder  Arnold,  I  find 
these  drastic  words  gleefully  quoted :  "  It  seems  to 
me  that  people  are  not  aware  of  the  monstrous  state 
of  society,  absolutely  without  a  parallel  in  the  history 
of  the  world,  with  a  population  poor,  miserable,  and 
degraded  in  body  and  mind,  as  if  they  were  slaves, 
and  yet  called  freemen.  And  the  hopes  entertained 
by  many,  of  the  effects  to  be  wrought  by  new  churches 
and  schools,  while  the  social  evils  of  their  conditions 
are  left  uncorrected,  appear  to  me  utterly  wild."  l 

1  I  first  saw  in  a  French  socialist  paper  this  passage  from  that 
delightful  writer,  Professor  Secretan :  — 

"  La  prolongation  du  regime  actuel  est  impossible.  Pour  s'en  con- 
vaincre,  il  suffit  de  mettre  en  presence  quelques-uns  des  elements  qui  le 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     i6l 

To  say  that  four  of  Ruskin's  volumes  have  been 
many  times  reprinted  in  labor  journals  is  hardly  too 
strong  a  statement.  The  following  is  a  favorite  pas- 
sage, "To  call  the  confused  wreck  of  social  order 
and  life  brought  about  by  malicious  collision  and 
competition  an  arrangement  of  Providence,  is  quite 
one  of  the  most  insolent  and  wicked  ways  in  which 
it  is  possible  to  take  the  name  of  God  in  vain." 

The  more  recent  developments  of  economic  litera- 
ture have  put  terrible  weapons  into  the  hands  of  the 
discontented.  Thorold  Rogers,  former  Oxford  econo- 
mist and  a  politician  of  large  experience,  tells  the  "  dis- 
possessed classes  "  why  written  political  economy  has 
been  so  solicitous  to  defend  the  vested  rights  of  actual 
society.  His  two  volumes  of  published  lectures  fur- 
nish twenty  instances  like  the  following  :  "  In  a  vague 
way  they  (the  laborers)  are  under  the  impression  that 
the  greater  part  of  the  misery  which  they  see  is  the 
direct  product  of  the  laws,  enacted  and  maintained  in 
the  interest  of  particular  classes.  And  on  the  whole 
they  are  in  the  right."  J 

This  passage  from  the  economist  Professor  Smart 
of  Glasgow  furnishes  food  for  very  pungent  com- 
ments in  a  labor  paper :  — 

"  But  when  machinery  is  replacing  man  and  doing 
the  heavy  work  of  industry,  it  is  time  to  get  rid  of 

constituent :  les  produits  du  travail  devolus  exclusivement  a  1'entrepre- 
neur  capitaliste,  1'immense  majorite"  des  ouvriers  depourvus  de  toute 
garantie  d'existence,  de  toute  securite  pour  1'avenir,  vivant  au  jour  le 
jour  d'un  salaire  juste  suffisant  pour  ne  pas  mourir  de  faim ;  puis  en 
face  de  ce  contraste  economique,  le  suffrage  universel  charge  d'en  as- 
surer 1'observation,  enfin  le  salariat  condamne  dans  la  conscience  des 
salaries,  et  la  guerre  sociale  en  permanence."  (Charles  Secretan :  La 
Civilisation  et  la  Croyance.}  1  The  italics  are  my  own. 

M 


1 62  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

that  ancient  prejudice  that  man  must  work  ten  hours 
a  day  to  keep  the  world  up  to  the  level  of  the  com- 
fort it  has  attained.  Possibly,  if  we  clear  our  minds 
of  cant,  we  may  see  that  the  reason  why  we  still  wish 
the  laborer  to  work  ten  hours  a  day  is  that  we,  the 
comfortable  classes,  may  go  on  receiving  the  lion's 
share  of  the  wealth  these  machines,  iron  and  human, 
are  turning  out." 

Professor  Cairnes  has  a  great  name  among  econo- 
mists for  ability  and  for  caution.  What,  then,  are 
thoughtful  workingmen  to  think  of  words  like  these 
from  his  "  Leading  Principles  "  ?  I  have  seen  them 
quoted  three  times  in  labor  papers.1 

"  Unequal  as  is  the  distribution  of  wealth  already 
in  this  country,  the  tendency  of  industrial  progress  — 
on  the  supposition  that  the  present  separation  be- 
tween industrial  classes  is  maintained  —  is  toward 
an  inequality  greater  still.  The  rich  will  be  growing 
richer;  and  the  poor,  at  least  relatively,  poorer.  It 
seems  to  me,  apart  altogether  from  the  question  of 
the  laborer's  interest,  that  these  are  not  conditions 
which  furnish  a  solid  basis  for  a  progressive  social 
state ;  but,  having  regard  to  that  interest,  I  think  the 
considerations  adduced  show  that  the  first  and  indis- 
pensable step  toward  any  serious  amendment  of  the 
laborer's  lot  is  that  he  should  be,  in  one  way  or  other, 
lifted  out  of  the  groove  in  which  he  at  present  works, 
and  placed  in  a  position  compatible  with  his  becom- 
ing a  sharer  in  equal  proportion  with  others  in  the 
general  advantages  arising  from  industrial  progress." 

After  Dr.  Spahr  published  his  volume  on  "The 

1  American  edition,  p.  285.  Let  the  reader  curious  to  follow 
Cairnes's  opinion  read  the  entire  fifth  chapter,  Part  II. 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     163 


Present  Distribution  of  Wealth  in  the  United  States," 
I  cut  from  the  organ  of  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor  the  following  table :  — 


CLASS 

FAMILIES 

PER 

CENT 

AVERAGE 
WEALTH 

AGGREGATE 
WEALTH 

PER 

CENT 

Rich 

Middle 
Poor 
Very  Poor 

125,000 
1,362,500 
4,762,500 
6,250,000 

I.O 

38.1 
50.0 

$263,040 
I4,l8o 

$32,88o,OOO,OOO 
I9,32O,OOO,OOO 
7,8oo,OOO,OOO 

54-8 
32.2 
13.0 

Total 

13,500,000 

1  00.0 

$4,800 

$6o,OOO,OOO,000 

IOO.O 

DIAGRAMS  SHOWING,  BY  PERCENTAGES,  THE  POPULA- 
TION AND  WEALTH  DISTRIBUTION  IN  THE  UNITED 
STATES  ACCORDING  TO  SPAHR'S  TABLES 


Population 


Rich,          1. 
Middle,  10.9 


Poor,       38.1 


Very 
Poor,  50. 


Wealth 


Rich,       54.8 

Middle,  32.2 
Poor,      13. 


A  little  later,  I  listened  to  a  popular  exposition  of 
this  table  enlarged  upon  a  blackboard  before  a  labor 
audience.  "  The  thin  dark  line  of  population  (one 
per  cent),"  said  the  speaker,  "  own  more  wealth  than 
the  remaining  ninety-nine  per  cent  of  us.  The  poor, 


1 64  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

though  they  are  eighty-eight  per  cent,  own  but 
thirteen  per  cent  of  the  wealth,  and  yet  we  are  ex- 
pected to  approve  a  system  which  has  so  little  to  say 
for  itself  as  that." 

I  do  not  personally  believe  that  trustworthy  sta- 
tistical sources  exist  that  enable  one  to  make  tables 
of  this  character  that  are  more  than  guesses  at  the 
fact.  Yet  if  it  were  known  what  the  possessions  of 
the  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  thousand  richest 
families  in  the  United  States  are,  the  result  would  be 
all  that  any  agitator  need  ask.  I  reproduce  the  table 
here,  to  show  how  words  like  those  of  Professors 
Cairnes,  Rogers,  and  Smart  can  be  used  to  give 
authoritative  support  to  extreme  and  indefensible 
inequalities.  In  the  instance  of  the  speaker  just 
quoted,  he  held  in  his  hand  a  trade-union  sheet  from 
which  he  read  the  passage  from  Professor  Cairnes. 

J.  S.  Mill  furnishes  so  many  extracts  dear  to  the  agi- 
tators that  he  appears  to  be  still  one  of  their  constant 
contributors.  What  is  the  dissatisfied  wage  earner 
to  think  of  this  passage  ? 

"  The  form  of  association,  however,  which,  if  man- 
kind continues  to  improve,  must  be  expected  in  the 
end  to  predominate,  is  not  that  which  can  exist  be- 
tween a  capitalist  as  chief  and  work-people  without  a 
voice  in  the  management,  but  the  association  of  the 
laborers  themselves  on  terms  of  equality,  collectively 
owning  the  capital  with  which  they  carry  on  their 
operations,  and  working  under  managers  selected 
and  removable  by  themselves."  1 

A  man  of  splendid  sobriety  like  Mill,  with  the 
best  economic  training  of  his  day,  subjects  the  cur- 

1  People's  edition,  p.  465. 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     1 6$ 

rent  communistic  schemes  to  minute  and  fearless 
criticism.  No  weakness  or  danger  in  these  collec- 
tivist  hopes  escapes  him.  He  sees  that  at  bot- 
tom it  is  all  a  question  of  securing  and  preserving 
the  maximum  of  individual  liberty.  He  will  have 
nothing  that  puts  this  liberty  in  jeopardy,  but  he 
objects  to  society  as  now  constituted  because  this 
real  freedom  of  the  individual  for  the  majority  of 
men  appears  to  him  in  imminent  danger.  He  writes 
his  conclusion  in  these  words,  "  Between  communism 
with  all  its  chances,  and  the  present  state  of  society 
with  all  its  sufferings  and  injustices,  ...  all  the  dif- 
ficulties great  or  small  of  communism  would  be  but 
as  dust  in  the  balance." 

These  words  of  Mill  are  a  direct  sanction  to  a  very 
large  part  of  what  socialists  claim  in  the  way  of  eco- 
nomic reorganization.  The  illustrious  author  asks 
no  less  than  the  upsetting  of  almost  every  separate 
idol  of  the  conventional  business  man's  piety.  What 
proposal  could  be  more  radical  than  to  make  the 
laborer  an  actual  partner,  to  democratize  industry, 
in  a  word,  as  we  are  trying  to  democratize  politics  ? 
Another  passage  from  his  autobiography  has  the 
same  frequent  use  :  — 

"  Our  ideal  of  ultimate  improvement  went  far  be- 
yond democracy,  and  would  class  us  decidedly  under 
the  general  name  of  socialists.  .  .  .  The  social  prob- 
lem of  the  future  we  considered  to  be  how  to  unite 
the  greatest  liberty  of  action  with  a  common  owner- 
ship in  the  raw  material  of  the  globe,  and  an  equal 
participation  of  all  the  benefits  of  combined  labor." 

One  would  not  expect  to  find  John  Fiske  in  such 
company,  but  I  have  twice  heard  him  quoted  by 


1 66  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

socialist  speakers,  and  once  seen  these  words 
printed :  "  Inherited  predatory  tendencies  of  men 
to  seize  upon  other  people's  labor  is  still  very  strong, 
and  while  we  have  nothing  more  to  fear  from  kings, 
we  may  yet  have  trouble  enough  from  commercial 
monopolies  and  favored  industries  marching  to  the 
polls  their  hosts  of  bribed  retainers." 

Lowell,  Frederic  Harrison,  John  Morley,  William 
Morris,  Howells,  each  furnishes  some  stinging  para- 
graph against  the  present  social  order.  One  of  our 
foremost  economists,  Professor  Henry  C.  Adams,  is 
gratefully  referred  to  by  a  labor  editor  as  writing  the 
following :  "  The  laborer  of  to-day,  as  compared  to 
the  non-laboring  classes,  holds  a  relatively  inferior 
position  to  that  maintained  in  former  times.  The 
laborer  interprets  this  to  mean  that  the  principle  of 
distribution  which  modern  society  has  adopted  is 
unfair  to  him." 

The  dignitaries  of  the  church  furnish  many  a  text 
for  labor  and  socialist  agitation.  These  words  are 
taken  from  Canon  Barnett  of  Toynbee  Hall :  — 

"The  policies  which  occupy  the  leaders'  minds, 
the  interests  of  business,  the  theologies,  the  fashions, 
are  but  webs  woven  in  the  trees  while  the  storm  is 
rising  in  the  distance.  Sounds  of  the  storm  are 
already  in  the  air,  a  murmuring  among  those  who 
have  not  enough,  puffs  of  boasting  from  those  who 
have  too  much,  and  a  muttering  from  those  who  are 
angry  because  while  some  are  drunken  others  are 
starving.  The  social  question  is  rising  for  solution, 
and,  though  for  a  moment  it  is  forgotten,  it  will 
sweep  to  the  front  and  put  aside  as  cobwebs  the 
'  deep '  concerns  of  leaders  and  teachers." 


THE  INEVITABLENESS  OF  THE  SOCIAL  QUESTION     167 

With  one  exception  I  have  found,  among  the 
clergy,  the  learned  Bishop  of  Durham  oftenest  in 
their  sheets.  The  exception  is  Pope  Leo  XIII. 
These  words  from  the  famous  encyclical  of  1891 
have  been  used  in  hundreds  of  labor  organs,  and 
repeated  before  innumerable  labor  audiences :  — 

"  The  momentous  seriousness  of  the  present  state  of 
things  just  now  fills  every  mind  with  painful  appre- 
hensions ;  wise  men  discuss  it,  practical  men  propose 
schemes;  popular  meetings,  legislatures,  and  sover- 
eign princes  all  are  occupied  with  it,  and  there  is 
nothing  which  has  a  deeper  hold  on  public  atten- 
tion. .  .  .  The  concentration  of  so  many  branches 
of  trade  in  the  hands  of  a  few  individuals,  so  that  a 
small  number  of  very  rich  men  have  been  able  to  lay 
upon  the  masses  a  yoke  little  better  than  slavery." 

We  should  make  very  paltry  estimate  of  this  new 
energy  added  to  the  labor  movement,  if  we  tested  this 
sympathetic  assent  by  its  agreement  upon  mere  matters 
of  material  or  administrative  changes.  Of  incompa- 
rably more  power  than  this  is  the  purely  moral  force 
which  these  great  names  lend  to  the  laborers'  struggle.1 

These  citations  are  literally  not  a  tenth  of  those 

1  Who  among  living  writers  has  shown  a  subtler  insight  into  the 
tendencies  of  his  time  than  De  Vogue  ?  In  a  masterly  essay,  "  L'heure 
Presente,"  he  quotes  Prince  Carolath  as  saying  that  in  Germany  "  the 
socialists  have  seduced  innumerable  idealists."  Though  this  is  to 
De  Vogue  la  folie  rationelle,  he  yet  adds :  "  Je  veux  seulement  marquer 
le  fait  d'ou  decoule  tout  entiere  sa  nouvelle  puissance :  le  socialisme 
a  capte  le  courant  d'idealisme  qui  se  reformait  partout  durant  ces 
mSmes  annees.  Une  conspiration  tacite,  inconsciente,  s'est  nouee 
entre  des  gens  que  tout  separe,  depuis  le  proletaire  qui  se  rue  aveugle"- 
ment  contre  la  machine  sociale  jusqu'aux  conducteurs  patentes  de 
cette  machine  ;  la  conspiration  commence  a  la  haine  d'en  bas  et  finit 
a  la  vague  pitie  d'en  haul." 


1 68  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

which  I  have  noted  in  the  printed  record  of  social 
revolt.  They  are  a  scattered  few  taken  from  the 
labor  and  socialist  papers  of  five  countries.  They 
represent  opinions  about  present  society  which  seem 
to  range  these  eminent  authors  on  the  side  of  the 
agitators.  No  socialist  recalcitrant  uses  more  embit- 
tered speech  against  the  fenced  mass  of  vested  pre- 
rogatives than  these  same  teachers.  Not  only  poets, 
artists,  and  men  of  letters,  but  savants  from  every 
field  enter  this  list.  They  condemn  a  society  that 
breeds  and  maintains  such  universal  and  revolting 
inequalities. 

The  question  I  wish  to  submit  is  this:  what  is  the 
probable,  yes,  inevitable  effect,  upon  the  mind  of  the 
average  wage  earner  who  constantly  reads  or  hears 
such  sustaining  sentiments  from  our  most  inspiring 
men  ?  Can  it  have  any  result  except  to  deepen  every 
faith  in  him  that  his  hope  for  social  reconstruction 
has  the  sanction  of  the  best  men  of  the  time  ?  Their 
testimony  appears  to  him,  first  of  all,  free  from  the 
bias  of  self-interest.  It  is  the  testimony  of  men  of 
genius  and  insight,  it  persuades  him,  therefore,  with 
redoubled  force. 


CHAPTER  VI 

MAN   AND    SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY 


IF  only  the  material  elements  of  the  problem  are 
considered,  socialism  is  so  largely  a  conflict  over  the 
ownership  of  machinery  that  little  headway  can  be 
made  until  its  difficulties  have  been  faced.  That 
the  world's  inventions  should  have  become  a  private 
possession  is  to  the  socialist  the  tragedy  of  modern 
industry. 

In  the  exclusive  power  which  this  ownership  gives, 
the  socialist  sees  the  intensifying  of  every  cruelty  in 
the  industrial  struggle  for  existence.  Largely  to  this 
ownership  he  attributes  the  slavish  dependence  of 
the  workman,  the  panting  scramble  of  competition 
with  its  chaotic  production  and  waste  of  human  life. 
Let  this  ownership,  together  with  the  earth's  area, 
pass  again  to  the  people,  and  a  swarm  of  evils  under 
which  we  now  stagger  shall  fall  from  us.  That  these 
"  means  of  production "  should  be  taken  from  the 
control  of  the  few  and  given  into  the  control  of  all,  is 
to  pass  from  slavery  to  a  free  and  self -directed  life. 
It  is  of  course  true  that  socialism  does  not  trust  alone 
to  the  mere  material  fact  of  this  transfer  of  posses- 
sion. It  has  its  own  ethical  idealism  and  a  very  noble 
appreciation  of  a  more  prolonged  and  thorough  train- 

169 


1 70  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

ing  for  every  child.  Socialism  sees  that  these  spiritual 
values  are  to  be  counted  in,  if  men  are  to  enter  into 
its  new  brotherhood.  The  economic  side  of  this 
endeavor  turns,  however,  on  the  machine  and  the 
"footing  on  which  it  rests." 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  there  is  in  this  view  no  objec- 
tion to  machinery  as  machinery.  The  objection  is 
against  its  individual  ownership.  Generations  of 
workmen  have  objected  to  the  machine  as  such,  while 
other  objectors,  who  cannot  be  classified,  show  a  keen 
antipathy  because  of  its  effects  upon  the  man  or  upon 
society. 

Emerson  says  manhood  has  been  shrunk  and  be- 
littled by  machinery.  "  The  robust  rural  Saxon  de- 
generates in  the  mills  to  the  Leicester  stockinger,  to 
the  imbecile  Manchester  spinner  —  far  on  the  way  to 
be  spiders  and  needles.  The  incessant  repetition  of 
the  same  hand-work  dwarfs  the  man,  robs  him  of  his 
strength,  wit,  and  versatility,  to  make  a  pin-polisher, 
a  buckle-maker,  or  any  other  speciality ; "  Ruskin,  in 
a  style  brilliant  as  fire,  preached  against  the  "  wheels  " 
of  progress  for  forty  years.  Morris  begins  the  pro- 
logue to  the  "  Earthly  Paradise  "  with  the  words  :  — 

Forget  six  counties  overhung  with  smoke, 
Forget  the  snorting  steam  and  piston  stroke, 
Forget  the  spreading  of  the  hideous  town. 

In  one  of  his  art  lectures  he  speaks  of  machines  that 
"  have  been  so  used  that  they  have  driven  all  men 
into  mere  frantic  haste  and  hurry,  thereby  destroying 
pleasure,  that  is  life,  on  all  hands ;  they  have,  instead 
of  lightening  the  labor  of  the  workmen,  intensified  it, 
and  thereby  added  more  weariness  yet  to  the  burden 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        171 

which  the  poor  have  to  carry."  Nor  is  it  alone  the 
poet  and  seer  who  see  the  ugly  side  of  all  this  cunning 
artifice.  I  once  asked  an  engineer  to  whom  great 
honor  has  been  given,  why  so  many  men  of  high 
intelligence  felt  this  disapproval.  He  replied :  "  Their 
instinct  is  as  right  about  it,  as  the  suspicion  of  the 
workman.  I  have  grown  up  with  machinery,  have 
watched  its  effect  for  years  in  shops  of  every  descrip- 
tion. I  say  Zola's  phrase,  '  La  Bete  Humaine,'  is 
an  exact  description.  The  great  machine  is  a  beast 
and  claims  its  victims  as  constantly  as  any  monster 
in  the  old  fables."  He  had  no  illusions  about  "  throw- 
ing more  men  out  than  are  set  to  work."  His  cen- 
sure was  because  so  much  of  this  power  has  to  be 
worked  in  places  and  under  conditions  that  slowly 
dehumanize  a  great  multitude  of  men,  women,  and 
youth. 

President  Hadley,  in  a  chapter  on  Machinery  ad- 
mirable for  discrimination,  admits  that,  "  The  charge 
that  the  factory  system  tends  to  deprive  the  laborer 
of  independence,  and  reduce  him  to  the  position  of  a 
machine,  is  not  so  easily  set  aside.  The  substitution 
of  mechanical  for  intelligent  labor  is  often  a  very 
serious  evil  in  modern  manufacturing,  .  .  .  large 
classes  of  men  who  were  most  useful  citizens  in  the 
past  are  being  driven  out  of  existence  by  the  stress 
of  modern  competition." 

John  Stuart  Mill  was  as  severe  in  his  upbraiding 
as  the  poets  when  he  expressed  the  conviction  that 
machinery  has  not  even  lightened  the  toil  of  the  race. 
The  sewing-machine  does  twenty  times  the  work  of 
the  unaided  needlewoman.  As  a  consequence,  cloaks, 
with  more  than  one  hundred  thousand  stitches,  are 


1/2  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

now  made.  Here  is  no  lessening  of  toil,  but  only 
heavy  accumulation  of  useless  and  stuffy  ornament. 
At  this  point  many  of  the  artists  cry  out  against 
machinery.  They  insist  that  although  it  gives  us 
mountainous  piles  of  objects ;  gives  us  infinite  quantity 
of  things,  it  deprives  us  of  beauty  and  delicacy.  The 
nobler  object  of  life  is  certainly  not  first  quantity, 
but  quality.  Quantity  as  such  does  not  necessa- 
rily represent  any  good  whatsoever.  The  newspaper 
is  called  the  educator  of  the  democracy.  It  is  an 
educator  in  a  good  sense  to  the  extent  that  it  has  ex- 
cellence of  quality.  But  presses  in  a  single  office 
may  turn  out  half  a  million  of  yellow  journals  in  a 
day.  They  make  a  Sunday  edition  of  thirty-two 
pages,  some  of  it  good,  some  of  it  rubbish,  and  a  part 
merely  despicable. 

The  opinions  just  quoted  are  a  challenge  to  the 
frisky  optimism  of  this  machine  age.  The  engineer 
spoke  from  experience,  Mill  from  a  singularly  cool 
judgment.  Morris,  printer,  designer,  weaver,  dyer, 
working  half  his  life  as  a  practical  craftsman,  yet  like 
his  master,  Ruskin,  never  lost  his  hatred  of  most  ma- 
chinery as  now  used.  Even  if  these  critics  do  not 
exaggerate  the  evil  side  of  machine  influence,  it  is 
evident  from  the  extracts  given  that  they  ignore  the 
immense  service  of  the  thing  they  blame. 

Mechanical  invention  represents  in  point  of  magni- 
tude the  all-dominating  force  of  our  time.  It  would 
leave  no  human  experience  uncontradicted  if  an 
energy  so  stupendous  did  not,  like  the  whole  world 
of  force,  have  its  pain  and  shadow  side. 

James  Nasmith,  in  his  Autobiography,  after  rejoic- 
ing in  the  triumph  of  his  Bridgewater  foundry, — 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        173 

increasing  the  skilled  workmen  and  raising  their 
wages,  —  adds,  that  habits  of  steady  application  among 
large  numbers  of  men  showed  a  tendency  to  lessen 
as  the  machinery  grew  more  perfect.  This  is  the 
spirit  of  a  fairer  attempt  to  balance  evenly  the  gain 
and  loss. 

Since  Emerson's  imprecation,  we  have  learned  to 
connect  some  unexpected  virtues  with  machinery.  It 
has  become  so  interwoven  with  our  entire  social  being 
that  it  reflects  our  common  character.  If  machinery 
symbolizes  greed,  it  also  symbolizes  many  forms  of 
improved  conduct  and  activity. 

The  requirements,  especially  of  the  great  public 
machinery  like  the  railroad,  make  for  better  manners 
as  well  as  for  temperance,  promptness,  and  accuracy. 
What  railroad  could  to-day  hold  its  own  in  competi- 
tion, if  it  tolerated  the  brusque  and  boorish  ways 
common  among  its  employees  less  than  a  generation 
ago  ?  Whatever  lack  of  civility  remains,  the  change 
on  many  lines  has  been  prodigious.  The  neat  uniform 
that  has  replaced  the  slouchy  and  indistinguishable 
dress,  is  a  change  no  more  marked  than  the  deport- 
ment toward  passengers.  The  superintendent  of  the 
Chicago  Telephone  Company  told  me :  "  Politeness, 
of  course,  we  will  have,  but  we  demand  much  more. 
If  we  can't  bring  a  girl  to  talk  in  pleasant  tones,  we 
don't  keep  her.  Neither  is  extreme  discourtesy  tol- 
erated from  those  who  hire  our  telephones.  We  take 
them  out  of  a  man's  house  or  office  if  he  talks 
brutally  or  coarsely  to  our  employees." 

The  electric  street  car  is  now  a  part  of  the  great 
machinery.  As  the  new  improvements  have  come,  a 
far  higher  grade  of  men  is  employed  upon  it.  Upon 


1/4  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

the  old  New  York  horse  cars,  a  large  proportion  of 
the  drivers  and  conductors  were  so  inferior  in  general 
appearance,  dress,  and  behavior  that  one  seemed  to 
be  in  the  presence  of  tramps.  The  slovenly  and 
lumbering  car  is  disappearing  before  a  clean  and 
luxurious  vehicle.  Yet  this  spacious  carriage  is  not 
more  of  an  advance  over  the  clumsy  thing  it  dis- 
places, than  the  men  who  serve  it  are  superior  in 
grade  to  their  predecessors. 

It  is*  the  nature  of  the  machine  to  test  and  to  select 
the  sort  of  capacity  fitted  to  operate  it.  That  it 
should  require,  where  it  touches  the  public,  greater 
sobriety  and  a  more  courteous  bearing,  is  in  part  a 
tribute  to  mechanism.  The  telephone  so  impinges 
upon  the  public  nerves  that  a  pleasant  voice  adds 
to  its  value.  When  the  telephone  is  at  last  in  every 
home,  and  every  operator  is  taught  a  proper  intona- 
tion, pleasant  voice  tones  will  become  a  commercial 
asset.  This  invention  will  then  be  found  to  work  as 
effectively  against  the  bad  voice,  which  all  foreigners 
note,  as  the  railroad  is  now  working  for  temperance. 

That  the  service  of  invention  has  not  been  confined 
to  material  profit  is  seen  in  the  aid  rendered  to  our 
political  development.  In  1800,  few  of  the  wiser 
men  believed  that  the  country,  as  we  know  it,  could 
be  held  together.  Whatever  other  causes  have 
contributed,  the  machinery  of  steam  transportation 
and  the  telegraph  have  perhaps  alone  been  power- 
ful enough  to  prevent  disunion.  The  great  property 
interests  have  been  both  distributed  and  united,  as 
,  families  have  been  scattered  and  yet  bound  together. 
So,  too,  specific  problems  of  dense  city  populations 
are  likely  to  have  more  help  in  their  solving  from 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        175 

electric  and  railroad  facilities  than  from  any  other 
source. 

Our  concern  with  machinery  is  here,  however,  rather 
with  the  problems  raised  by  labor  and  socialistic  agi- 
tation. As  this,  in  the  view  of  the  writer,  is  the  most 
fundamental  of  the  purely  practical  issues,  it  will  be 
considered  at  length. 

That  which  glares  at  us  on  the  surface  is  the 
machine's  capacity  to  multiply  the  product  which 
makes  our  wealth.  This  is  kept  to  the  front  by  all 
who  sing  the  praises  of  invention.  Industrial  history 
nowhere  furnishes  so  many  brilliant  illustrations  as 
this  story  of  mechanical  achievement  adding  to  the 
creature  comforts.  Where  there  was  no  tool  or  only 
primitive  ones,  the  race  lived  from  hand  to  mouth, 
and  not  even  that  continuously.  Where  machinery 
is  highly  developed,  wealth  increases  far  more  rapidly 
than  population.  Even  if  its  distribution  is  unfair, 
the  higher  wages  and  fewer  hours  that  follow  are 
traceable,  first  of  all  to  the  swelling  product  of  the 
machine.  Many  printers  upon  one  of  our  great 
papers  receive  six  and  seven  dollars  a  day.  If  the 
printing  tools  of  a  half  century  ago  were  still  in  use, 
the  wages  would  not  be  half  this  sum.  With  the  old 
tools  they  could  not  make  that  quantity  of  papers 
which  attracts  the  advertiser.  The  machine  alone 
makes  possible  the  hundred  thousand  edition  with 
its  world  of  readers.  It  is  to  reach  these  that  the 
advertiser  so  roundly  pays.  Here  is  the  source  that 
makes  the  high  wage  a  possibility. 

A  well-known  conductor  on  one  of  our  great  roads, 
who  has  lived  thirty-three  years  of  his  life  on  moving 
trains,  tells  me  that  the  comfort  of  the  trainmen  has 


1/6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

increased  with  all  the  most  important  mechanical  im- 
provements. "  Every  five  years  I  can  see  the  condi- 
tions of  work  are  a  little  easier,  and  I  think  safer. 
When  I  began  as  a  brakeman,  the  life  was  cruelly 
hard,  but  now  automatic  devices  do  the  heaviest 
work.  It  is  so  much  easier  that  about  the  only  dif- 
ference that  I  see  between  the  brakeman  and  the 
passenger  is  that  the  brakeman  doesn't  have  to  pay 
for  his  ride."  These  improvements  may  be  noted 
on  every  decent  railroad  in  the  United  States.  This 
improvement  is  quite  as  much  moral  as  it  is  material. 
The  conductor  was  telling  the  story  of  a  score  of 
roads  when  he  added :  "  We  used  to  have  few  men  on 
the  road  who  did  not  drink  to  excess.  They  visited 
saloons  freely  at  the  station  during  working  hours, 
and  half  of  them  carried  whiskey  openly  in  the  train. 
All  that  has  been  changed  so  entirely,  that  I  do  not 
know  a  more  temperate  set  of  men  than  trainmen. 
We  simply  can't  keep  our  places  and  have  it  known 
that  we  drink  in  working  hours,  or  drink  too  much 
off  time.  The  risk  is  too  great  to  allow  a  man  in  the 
business  who  has  any  intemperate  tendency."  The 
value  of  this  evidence  is  great  because  it  answers 
conclusively  one  of  the  oldest  arguments  against 
machinery,  that  it  necessarily  lowers  the  quality  of 
the  man.  As  a  generalized  statement  this  is  now  seen 
to  be  false. 

% 

The  economic  section  of  the  committee  of  fifty 
found  this  so  true  that  it  could  substantiate  Carroll 
D.  Wright's  previous  judgment,  "The  greatest  single 
influence  in  the  United  States,  making  for  temperance, 
is  the  railroad." 

The  cheapness  and  abundance  of   grain  foods  is 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        177 

explained  when  the  story  of  machinery  has  been 
told.  Mr.  Holmes  of  the  Agricultural  Department 
has  traced  the  history  of  the  plough.  One  wonders 
at  the  existence  of  any  type  of  mind  that  would  not 
be  fascinated  in  Johri  Deere's  works  at  Moline, 
Illinois,  where  these  marvels  of  human  invention  are 
produced.  Could  Ruskin  have  been  patient  to  watch 
these  processes,  and  still  be  satisfied  to  load  the  result 
with  abuse  ?  They  are  as  strictly  triumphs  of  imagi- 
nation as  any  most  brilliant  page  that  he  ever  wrote. 

The  steam-gang  plough,  combined  with  a  seeder  and 
a  harrow,  has  reduced  the  time  required  for  human 
labor  (in  ploughing,  sowing,  and  harrowing)  to  produce 
a  bushel  of  wheat,  on  an  average,  from  32.8  minutes 
in  1830  to  2.2  minutes  at  the  present  time.  It  has 
reduced  the  time  of  animal  labor  per  bushel  from 
57  to  i£  minutes;  at  the  same  time  it  has  reduced 
the  cost  of  human  and  animal  labor  in  ploughing, 
seeding,  and  harrowing  per  bushel  of  wheat  from 
4  cents  to  i  cent. 

As  a  boy  I  watched  men  shelling  corn  by  hand 
across  the  edge  of  a  shovel,  or  grinding  one  ear 
against  another.  One  may  now  see  a  machine  that 
shells  a  bushel  every  minute,  besides  packing  it  into 
a  sack  ready  for  delivery.  This  means  abundance 
and  cheapness. 

Before  Whitney's  invention  it  required  the  work  of 
one  person  ten  hours  to  take  the  seeds  from  one  and 
a  half  pounds  of  cotton.  The  machine  will  now  do, 
in  the  same  ten  hours,  more  than  four  thousand  times 
as  much.  That  ten  million  bales  can  be  marketed  in 
a  season,  and  that  cloth  is  so  cheap,  is  no  longer  a 
wonder. 


178  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

A  linen  sheet  that  once  cost  thirty  days'  labor  can 
now  be  made  in  seven  hours.  A  steam  shovel  will 
do  in  eight  minutes  what  one  man  can  do  with  diffi- 
culty in  ten  hours.  The  dirt  may  be  unloaded  from 
a  train  of  cars  in  six  minutes,  that  would  require,  with 
the  shovel,  a  day's  work  of  ten  men.  A  stone-crusher 
will  perform  the  work  of  six  hundred  men.  Few 
material  blessings  bring  more  comfort  to  every  class 
in  the  community  than  good  roads.  To  none  is  the 
advantage  greater  than  to  large  sections  of  the  rela- 
tively poor,  as  in  country  districts.  Yet  the  rapid 
growth  of  these  highways  is  almost  exclusively  the 
result  of  the  machine.  I  choose  this  more  striking 
form  of  invention  because  it  is  largely  against  such 
that  labor  has  raised  its  most  angry  protest. 

To  comfortable  people  generally  this  cry  of  the 
workman  against  machinery  is  a  plain  imbecility. 
"  Does  he  know  his  interest  so  little  as  to  object  to  a 
labor-saving  contrivance  ?  Does  it  not  heap  up  the 
product  out  of  which  his  wages  and  well-being  come  ? 
There  is  of  course  great  inconvenience  now  and  then 
to  the  individual,  but  it  is  merely  incidental.  You 
laborers  must  trust  to  the  '  long  run.'  The  machinery 
that  throws  you  out,  or  cuts  your  wages,  makes  more 
work  here  or  elsewhere.  The  thing  it  makes  falls  in 
price,  which  is  but  another  way  of  raising  your  wages." 
It  was  thought  that  labor  should  be  docile  after  this 
explanation  of  the  distant  and  ultimate  good  which 
machinery  brings.  But  the  race  of  hand-to-mouth 
workmen  that  would  be  satisfied  with  such  advice 
is,  happily,  not  yet  born.  Only  a  rare  few,  even 
among  business  men,  act  upon  the  "  long  run " 
motive.  The  average  employer  is  concerned  with 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        179 

the  profits  of  the  next  six  months,  i.e.  with  "  the  short 
run."  The  uncertainties  about  tariff  changes,  about 
the  permanence  of  good  times,  and,  above  all,  about 
the  pressure  of  competition,  often  make  this  the  only 
practicable  course  to  follow.  The  trade  unions  are 
only  copying  the  employers  when  they  reply :  "  We 
cannot  postpone  our  share  until  years  of  time  bring, 
if  they  do  bring,  cheaper  products.  The  employer 
may  be  able  —  aided  by  patent  laws  —  to  keep  all  the 
good  to  himself  for  years.  We  have  a  right  to  every 
good  that  organization  can  give  us  at  the  time." 

Better  than  all  outside  advisers,  labor  has  known 
the  dangers  which  threatened  it.  It  has  watched  the 
troop  of  women  and  children  pouring  in  as  competi- 
tors among  the  men.  It  saw  that  these  were  taken 
solely  because  they  would  work  for  less.  In  this 
country  labor  soon  learned  that  machine  industries 
demand  a  "  reserve  army."  Then,  if  business 
presses,  workmen  are  at  hand ;  when  it  slackens,  they 
can  be  turned  off. 

Where  machinery  has  brought  high  and  quick  prof- 
its, it  has  put  a  premium  upon  every  form  of  cheaper 
labor, — woman,  child,  and  immigrant.  This  it  is  which 
has  introduced  among  the  laborers  a  competition  as 
merciless  as  any  that  employing  capitalists  bewail 
among  themselves.  To  press  the  "  long  run  "  view 
upon  the  laborer,  under  these  conditions,  is  to  assume 
an  innocence  that  he  did  not  possess  even  two  gener- 
ations ago.  Labor's  relation  to  machinery  has  been 
darkened  by  dangerous  economic  illusions,  yet  the 
tenacious  instinct  that  the  implements  of  toil  should 
be  far  more  under  his  own  control  was  sound  from 
the  beginning.  It  is  in  this  rooted  faith  that  one 


ISO  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

sees  far  off  the  hope  of  a  genuinely  democratic 
society.  When  separate  tools  were  joined  and  fitted 
into  more  elaborate  instruments,  they  slipped  from 
labor  ownership  because  labor  was  weak  from  igno- 
rance and  poverty.  It  was  in  no  way  fitted  for  such 
proprietorship.  The  modern  social  question  has  largely 
risen  out  of  the  conflict  between  capitalistic  ownership 
and  the  workman's  sense  of  lost  mastery.  In  the  earlier 
stages,  when  inventions  multiplied  so  rapidly,  the  la- 
borer struck  at  them  savagely,  as  at  an  enemy.  He 
saw  his  fellows  constantly  dropped,  and  customary 
wage  payment  upset  and  readjusted.  In  his  igno- 
rance it  appeared  to  him  that  his  very  hold  upon 
life  was  lost. 

From  the  larger  social  point  of  view  it  is  very 
simple  to  show  the  error  into  which  the  workman  fell.1 

If  machinery  were  upon  the  whole  robbing  him  of 
work,  then  a  relatively  smaller  part  of  our  population 
must,  decade  by  decade,  be  occupied  with  machinery. 
Every  investigator  knows  that  the  exact  opposite 
of  this  is  true.  There  is  no  decade  since  1850,  in 
which  it  cannot  be  shown  that  machinery  has  set  a 
larger  and  larger  proportion  of  people  to  work.  The 
proportion  of  those  earning  a  livelihood  directly  by 
the  help  of  machinery  was  never  so  great  as  at  the 
present  moment. 

1  The  dire  conflicts  in  the  cities  of  Midland  England,  in  the  first  half 
of  the  nineteenth  century,  have  had,  even  by  the  novelists,  most  dramatic 
recital.  Boston  trade  unions  had  this  subject  under  frequent  discussion 
about  1830.  Five  years  later  a  New  York  publicist  wrote,  "  It  is  well 
known  that  many  of  the  most  violent  and  lawless  proceedings  have 
been  excited  for  the  purpose  of  destroying  newly  invented  machinery." 
Albany  printers  struck  against  a  machine  to  print  Bibles,  although  the 
book  could  thus  be  delivered  "  folded  "  for  four  cents  a  copy. 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY         l8l 

It  is  seen  that  hundreds  are  thrust  aside,  it  is  less 
easily  seen  that  masses  are  set  to  work.  One  has 
only  to  analyze  the  indirect  services  which  invention 
creates  to  admit  the  force  of  this.  Upon  the  old 
handloom  one  could  weave  forty  yards  of  shirting  in 
the  week.  To-day  the  weaver  may  produce  in  a 
week  sixteen  hundred  yards,  or  forty  times  as  much. 
If  the  making  and  delivery  of  the  raw  material  and 
the  distribution  of  the  finished  product,  forty  times  as 
great  be  taken  into  account,  no  one  will  doubt  that 
the  machine  stimulates  more  activity  than  it  displaces. 

Printing  machinery  has  been  especially  selected  as 
illustrating  the  displacement  of  labor.  Yet  it  can  be 
proved  to  a  certainty  that  far  more  men  and  women 
are  occupied  in  this  industry  than  ever  before.  The 
inventions  have  so  cheapened  processes  as  to  make 
possible  innumerable  products  like  the  Munsey  and 
McClure  magazines,  in  the  making  and  distributing 
of  which  a  new  army  of  persons  has  been  set  to  work.1 

The  Hoe  press  prints,  folds,  cuts,  and  pastes 
seventy-two  thousand  eight-page  journals  in  a  single 
hour.  To  gather  the  material,  make  and  deliver  the 
raw  paper,  finally  to  distribute  the  printed  sheets 
daily  in  twenty  states,  must  bring  occupation  to  many 
more  than  the  machine  dislodged. 

1 1  once  listened  to  a  discussion  of  this  subject  before  a  trade-union 
gathering  in  which  three  printers  began  by  maintaining  that  invention 
was  doing  each  year  a  larger  part  of  the  work  and  men  a  lessened 
part.  When  a  clear  statement  had  been  made  of  the  numbers  set  to 
work  by  more  than  twenty  new  periodicals,  —  paper-making,  machine- 
making,  distributing,  and  even  printing,  — it  was  finally  conceded  by  all 
that  the  results  of  the  new  instruments  had  made  occupation  for  many 
more  men  than  had  been  displaced.  The  concrete  effects  of  a  single 
machine  before  the  eyes  had  alone  been  taken  into  account. 


1 82  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Invention  has  created  hundreds  of  new  industries. 
The  railroad  alone  employs  more  than  a  million. 
The  telegraph,  telephone,  bicycle,  illustrate  new  voca- 
tions made  outright  for  millions  of  workers.  The 
railroad  displaced  the  coach,  but  the  express  business, 
affiliated  with  the  railroad,  has  set  to  work  many 
men  where  the  old  coach  employed  one.  The  tele- 
graph and  telephone  have  made  work  for  many  times 
more  than  can  ever  have  been  displaced.  The  mo- 
ment that  the  indirect  services  which  invention  pro- 
duces are  estimated,  the  case  appears  stronger  still. 

These  showy  achievements  have  been  thought  to 
be  the  final  and  crushing  answer  to  labor's  complaint. 
The  answer  is  not  final.  The  workman  has  learned 
the  indirect,  long-run  advantage  of  much  machinery, 
but  he  is  incontestably  right  in  striving,  with  his  full 
associated  strength,  to  get  all  possible  immediate 
advantages  from  the  invention ;  to  lessen  individual 
and  short-run  evils.  This  half-blind  instinct  of  labor 
is  at  one  with  what  we  are  all  slowly  learning  ;  namely, 
that  they  who  own  much  of  the  great  mechanism,  es- 
pecially if  it  rest  on  a  natural  monopoly  may  get  and 
long  keep  to  their  excessive  fattening,  privileges  and 
resources  that  should  be  far  more  open  to  the  general 
enrichment.  If  we  add  political  control  to  this  private 
control  of  machinery  and  natural  opportunity,  we  have 
that  against  which  the  whole  storm  of  social  discon- 
tent will  beat  in  the  next  generation.  Labor's  rela- 
tion to  some  specific  forms  of  industrial  machinery, 
as  now  owned  and  guarded,  is  precisely  that  of  our 
own  wider  relation  to  certain  monopolized  privileges. 

The  philosophic  advisers  of  the  workingman  have 
rarely  been  fair  to  him  in  this  frantic  contest  with 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY          183 

the  new  inventions.  There  was  from  the  beginning 
a  heart  of  truth  even  in  his  wildest  errors.  It  is  often 
the  very  nature  of  a  successful  new  machine  to  dis- 
turb the  normal  local  wage  in  such  way  as  to  make  it 
seem  an  enemy  to  those  affected  by  it.  I  can  illus- 
trate this  by  an  experience  once  given  me  by  one  of 
the  most  influential  socialists  in  this  country.  "  I 
was  trained  in  an  English  machine-shop,  coming  to 
the  States  for  better  chances  here  offered.  My 
wages  finally  reached  $4  a  day,  when  a  new  invention 
cut  me  down  to  $2.50.  I  again  reached  $3.50,  when 
another  contrivance  cut  me  to  $3.  I  got  a  little  above 
this,  only  a  third  time  to  be  docked  to  $2.50.  When 
I  became  convinced  that  with  the  best  effort  I  could 
make  there  was  no  chance  to  get  beyond  a  certain 
line,  I  quit  trying,  and  have  since  done  all  I  could  to 
further  the  cause  of  socialism  among  my  fellows." 
There  are,  of  course,  many  varieties  of  machine  work 
in  which  this  experience  is  untrue.  There  are  proba- 
bly more  in  which  it  accurately  describes  what  is  con- 
tinually occurring. 

It  frequently  happens  that  a  foreman's  personal 
advancement  depends  upon  the  good  showing  he  can 
make  to  the  employer  in  his  own  department.  To 
do  this,  he  is  often  able  to  use  new  inventions  (as  in 
the  above  case)  to  keep  wages  low  among  as  many  of 
his  men  as  he  can  force  or  induce  to  accept  the  situ- 
ation. Special  skill  may  at  the  same  time  be  consid- 
erably advanced,  while  others  with  only  average 
ability,  but  with  some  sort  of  disposition  or  qualities 
that  require  prudent  handling,  may  still  receive  the 
old  wage.  I  have  heard  these  processes  described 
with  no  concealment  by  several  foremen.  In  Pitts- 


1 84  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

burg  one  told  me :  "  I  must  keep  as  many  men  down 
as  I  can  keep  down  (in  their  wages),  or  my  report  to 
the  boss  would  be  against  me.  If  I  didn't  do  it,  he 
would  find  plenty  of  men  who  would." 

It  is  in  these  almost  infinitely  varying  details  of  the 
actual  workshop  that  one  learns  the  limitations  to  all 
buoyant  generalizations  about  machinery.  Let  us 
look  at  another  very  common  case. 

In  an  Illinois  foundry  I  heard  it  said  with  some 
indignation,  "  Talk  about  healthy  men ;  look  at  them 
for  yourself;  there  isn't  a  man  who  suffers  from  it." 
The  work  was  ten  hours  for  six  days  in  the  week.  It 
was  thought  absurd  that  the  men  should  want  a 
Saturday  half-holiday.  Here  were  several  hundred 
men  living  amidst  hideous  surroundings.  Thirty 
saloons  were  within  ten  minutes'  walk.  They  were 
the  natural  recreation  places  for  the  larger  part  of  the 
men  when  their  work  was  done.  It  was  the  opinion 
of  a  foreman  that  those  who  did  not  habitually  go  to 
them  and  spend  a  larger  part  of  their  wages  were  in 
the  minority.  "  Most  of  us  go,  of  course,"  said  one; 
"  what  else  is  there  to  do  ?  The  free  lunch  will  give 
us  food  and  whiskey,  too,  for  ten  cents."  I  went 
into  one  of  the  most  popular  saloons.  It  was  filled 
with  these  men  between  nine  and  ten  o'clock.  They 
were  reading  the  Police  Gazette,  playing  cards  and 
pool,  and  throwing  dice  for  drinks.  If  one  could 
have  looked  upon  the  entire  picture,  others  would  have 
been  seen,  some  at  their  homes,  some  at  the  library 
a  mile  away,  but  these  were  the  few  against  the  many. 
It  would  be  as  silly  to  blame  these  men,  as  to  call  the 
employer  hard  names.  The  nature  of  the  business, 
the  sharp  rivalry  of  competing  firms,  left  small  margin 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY         185 

for  philanthropies.  If  work  must  be  carried  on  under 
those  conditions  so  strenuously  and  with  so  little 
relief,  society  must  pay  the  price.  "  My  machinery 
is  such,"  said  the  employer,  "  that  it  must  be  run  fast 
and  continuously,  or  I  should  shut  down  and  turn 
them  all  off.  It  is  not  a  pleasant  place,  but  I  am 
forced  to  be  close  to  the  river  and  close  to  the  freight 
depots."  This  is  a  fair  description  of  thousands  of 
mills  and  shops.  The  machine,  in  the  large  sense  in 
which  the  word  must  be  used,  including  the  railroad, 
shipping  lines,  etc.,  seems  too  often  to  compel  the  se- 
lection of  working  places  that  are  beset  by  every  un- 
wholesome influence  that  can  play  upon  the  laborer's 
life.  Too  often  his  family  must  be  reared  hard  by,  in 
surroundings  as  loathsome  as  many  of  those,  for 
instance,  that  disgrace  the  neighborhood  of  the  great 
Chicago  packing  houses. 

As  long  as  the  machinery  practically  requires  so 
beggarly  and  mean  a  setting  as  this,  we  cannot  con- 
sider the  environment  as  an  unrelated  part  of  the 
evil.  Modern  machine  industry  has  gathered  the 
workers  into  towns  and  cities,  or  grouped  them  in 
masses  in  mines  and  factories.  It  has  set  them  to 
work  upon  a  mechanism  so  complicated  that  its 
effects  can  only  be  truly  imaged,  when  we  think 
of  the  railroad,  telegraph,  telephone,  steamship, 
power  loom,  and  all  other  seemingly  isolated  ma- 
chines, locked  together  into  one  stupendous  enginery. 
About  this,  in  it,  and  through  it  the  swarming  mill- 
ions are  at  work.  The  tides  of  commerce  play  upon 
it  sluggishly  for  a  time,  leaving  a  third  or  a  fourth 
of  the  attendants  in  chronic  idleness,  then,  every  belt 
and  axle  are  hot  to  meet  the  clamor  for  all  the 


1 86  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

products  that  can  be  thrown  upon  the  market.  The 
army  of  operatives  has  to  do  the  bidding  of  this 
monster  feeder  of  human  wants. 

All  that  portion  of  machinery  that  is  of  necessity 
overdriven  and  placed  in  extremes  of  dampness,  heat, 
or  dust,  as  it  often  is,  is  not  an  unmixed  blessing.  I 
asked  an  engineer  on  an  ocean  steamship  about  the 
life  of  the  stokers  working  in  an  atmosphere  of  one 
hundred  and  ten  degrees  Fahrenheit.  He  said,  "  Oh, 
it  makes  beasts  of  them,  but  we  can't  help  it." 
Whenever  machinery  cannot  be  used  except  in  con- 
ditions that  brutalize  life,  we  call  it  an  evil,  even  if  a 
necessary  one.  If  the  speed  is  so  great  that  the 
average  man  or  woman  cannot  stand  the  strain  be- 
yond a  half  of  one's  natural  life,  it  is  an  evil,  and 
an  evil  far  beyond  its  effect  on  the  individual,  for 
it  strikes  at  parenthood,  producing  a  devitalized  off- 
spring that  constitutes  the  chief  horror  of  many  in- 
dustrial centres. 

With  the  manager  of  one  of  the  great  iron  indus- 
tries in  Pennsylvania,  I  watched  several  hundred  men 
working  a  full  eleven-hour  day  in  a  deafening  noise 
and  in  an  atmosphere  murky  with  dust.  A  portion 
of  the  work,  which  continued  unremitting  through  the 
twenty-four  hours,  was  done  by  "  double  shift."  This 
required  a  twelve-hour  day.  The  speed  throughout 
was  as  high  as  the  men  could  be  induced  to  take. 
Unprompted,  the  manager  said :  "  It  is  a  pity  that 
men  have  to  work  like  this,  but  there  is  no  help  for  it. 
The  machinery  drives  us  at  a  gallop  as  well  as  the 
men.  To  clean  the  place  up  decently  and  run  it  eight 
hours,  would  shut  it  up  in  a  week.  Our  worst  com- 
petitor, in ,  drives  harder  than  we  do,  and  gets 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        187 

more  out  of  his  men."  I  asked  about  the  wages. 
"The  men  with  skill  are  well  paid,  —  $2.50  upwards 
to  $3.00,  and  even  $4.00,  —  but  the  mass  of  unskilled 
get  perhaps  $1.50,  just  enough  to  exist.  If  they  have 
families,  I  don't  see  how  they  manage  it."  Let  it  be 
admitted  that  machinery  is,  in  general,  a  blessing ;  but 
what  sort  of  a  blessing  does  it  bring  to  such  as  these  ? 
It  is  better  than  starvation,  but  what  rational  end  of 
life  can  be  attained  with  eleven  or  twelve  hours'  daily 
toil  in  these  surroundings  ?  The  manager  made  it  clear 
why  nothing  better  could  be  done.  "  The  boom  has 
come,  and  while  it  lasts  our  success  depends  upon 
driving  as  if  life  was  at  stake."  This  description  is 
accurate,  —  "  While  the  boom  is  on,  our  success  de- 
pends upon  driving  as  if  life  was  at  stake." 

To  such  straits  have  these  organized  forces  brought 
us:  first  a  hot  race  with  competing  rivals,  then  a 
glutted  market ;  first  the  boom,  then  the  depression ; 
first  long  and  crowded  hours,  then  lack  of  work  and 
men  adrift.  This  sorry  see-saw  in  the  industrial 
world  is  the  puzzle  of  the  economist  and  the  despair 
of  the  practical  man.  This  network  of  great  inven- 
tions cannot  be  put  down  as  the  exclusive  cause  of 
the  evil,  but  that  the  evil  is  enhanced  by  this  cause 
is  certain.  This  means  that  we  are  half  enslaved  by 
a  great  deal  of  our  own  mechanism.  It  means  that 
we  honestly  care  more  for  the  machine's  output  in 
wealth,  than  we  care  for  manhood,  womanhood,  and 
wholesome  family  life.  It  means  that  we  do  not  first 
and  profoundly  care  for  citizenship  and  a  reputable 
society.  If  these  workers  can  keep  their  animal 
strength  and  tend  the  machine,  is  it  not  enough  ? 
The  absolute  requisitions  of  culture  of  any  kind  — 


1 88  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

a  minimum  of  unexhausted  leisure,  of  real  freshness 
of  body  and  mind  —  would  take  at  least  two  hours 
off  every  working  day.  It  affronts  our  intelligence 
to  say  that  the  average  man  can  do  that  kind  of 
work  more  than  eight  hours  daily,  and  have  left  over 
the  leisure,  the  moral  and  intellectual  surplus  of 
energy,  for  humanizing  objects.  The  loss  to  good 
citizenship,  to  social  peace  and  safety,  is  an  abiding 
threat  to  social  peace.  If  we  were  not  the  easy 
victims  of  wont  and  usage,  accepting  the  actual  as 
natural,  we  should  one  and  all  revolt  against  this 
awful  waste  of  human  values.  That  the  future  will 
class  it  as  a  form  of  slavery,  seems  to  me  assured. 

A  very  large  proportion  of  capitalistic  investment 
is  now  embodied  in  machinery  of  the  most  delicate 
and  costly  character.  When  the  complex  enginery 
is  once  started,  it  has  to  be  "  tended "  precisely  as 
if  it  were  the  most  frail  human  life  or  plant.  It 
is  as  safe  to  shut  up  and  desert  a  hothouse  of  dainty 
flowers,  as  to  close  up  and  desert  modern  machinery. 
Every  hostile  element  attacks  it  as  if  bent  on  instant 
destruction.  To  prevent  this  devastation,  mills  are 
often  run  at  great  loss,  when  trade  is  dull,  thus  piling 
up  the  product  of  an  overstocked  market. 

Another  type  of  evil  in  the  Western  rural  districts 
that  cannot  be  dissociated  from  machinery  is  de- 
scribed in  the  following  words  by  a  competent  local 
observer :  — 

"The  influence  of  large  farms  on  country  life  is 
unquestionably  deplorable.  The  summer  population 
of  the  big  wheat  farm  is  composed  mainly  of  a  drift- 
ing class  of  laborers  with  no  attachment  to  the  soil 
and  with  no  interest  in  their  work  beyond  getting 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        189 

their  pay.  In  the  winter  they  go  to  the  pineries  or 
hang  about  the  cities  looking  for  odd  jobs.  The 
winter  population  of  the  farm  is  reduced  to  a  few 
men  who  take  care  of  the  stock,  and  perhaps  one 
of  the  foremen  who  has  a  family.  Usually  the 
manager  and  his  family  go  to  some  town  to  pass 
the  dead  season." 

The  Hon.  C.  A.  Ficke  of  Iowa,  speaking  of  ordi- 
nary farms,  tells  me :  "  From  an  acquaintance  with 
every  county  in  the  state,  I  should  say  that  the 
drifting  character  of  this  hired  farm  help  is  an  al- 
most unqualified  evil.  Many  of  our  farmers  carry  on 
their  work  by  the  help  of  machinery  in  such  way 
that  they  can  dispense  with  the  '  hands '  except  for 
a  few  weeks  in  the  year.  These  men  are  well  paid 
during  this  time,  then  they  scatter  in  search  of  desul- 
tory jobs,  many  of  them  seeking  the  large  towns  and 
cities,  where  the  uncertain  nature  of  their  employ- 
ment ruins  hundreds  of  them.  Thousands  of  farmers 
in  these  parts  will  not  hire  a  man  accompanied  by 
his  family.  The  results  of  this  are  equally  bad." 

In  all  this  the  employer  is  often  as  much  a  victim 
as  the  employed.  His  mill,  too,  is  but  a  cog  in  a 
vaster  mechanism.  It  turns  now  swiftly,  now  lazily, 
according  to  the  throb  of  the  great  markets  which 
are  its  life.  The  individual  employer  takes  the 
breathless  pace,  because  it  is  the  pace  of  the  army  in 
which  he  marches.  It  is  partly  because  he  is  swept 
on  by  forces  greater  than  himself,  that  he  must  snatch 
so  eagerly  at  the  little  power  within  his  grasp.  The 
inventions  under  his  own  hand,  he  can  in  some  degree 
appropriate  as  absolute  property.  "Trade  secrets," 
royalties,  and  patents  he  can  secure  for  a  little  space. 


THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

In  this  scramble  a  new  machine  appears  upon  the 
scene.  If  the  employer  can  put  it  in,  on  his  own 
conditions,  —  no  questions  asked,  —  he  may,  if  -hard 
pressed  by  a  competitor,  drive  a  very  sharp  bargain 
with  his  workmen.  Now  he  drops  men,  now  he 
introduces  girls  and  boys,  now  he  cuts  wages.  In 
this  moment  of  possible  difference  between  the  felt 
interests  of  employer  and  workmen  over  the  intro- 
ducing of  a  new  invention,  a  large  part  of  the  social- 
ist problem  springs  into  existence.  The  test  question 
often  arises,  who  shall  have  the  new  increment  of 
gain  which  the  machine  brings  ?  Shall  the  employer 
have  all  the  good  of  it  because  the  invention  is  his  ? 
Again  and  again  I  have  heard  it  asserted,  "  I  have 
bought  it,  and  all  the  advantage  that  comes  with  it  is 
my  own."  It  is  doubtful  if  this  claim  would  be  chal- 
lenged, if  in  introducing  the  machine  no  disturbance 
to  labor  were  caused,  but  the  more  perfect  the  inven- 
tion, the  more  likely  is  it  to  derange  the  labor  group 
that  used  the  discarded  machine.  The  new  machine 
is  usually  the  death  of  the  old  one  which  it  replaces. 
The  attempt  of  the  union  to  divide  the  advantage  of 
the  new  invention  with  the  employer  has  been  the 
heart  of  an  immemorial  strife.  When  ignorance 
gives  place  to  enlightenment,  the  union  will  not 
"oppose  machinery."  This  the  intelligent  ones  have 
long  since  learned.  Neither  will  they  yield  the 
pivotal  point  of  doing  all  in  their  power  to  secure  as 
much  immediate  benefit  as  the  organization  can  effect. 

This  point  is  so  vital  that  it  should  have  ample 
illustration.  An  improved  invention  is  perfected  and 
brought  to  the  mill  or  factory  for  introduction.  The 
employer,  especially  if  he  is  plagued  by  unionism, 


MAN  AND  SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY         191 

uses  extreme  caution  in  putting  the  new  device  to 
work.  In  countless  cases,  he  first  selects  the  most 
alert  and  vigorous  among  his  workers  and  practises 
them,  to  see  how  fast  the  new  invention  can  be 
run,  and  how  large  a  product  it  can  be  made  to 
turn  out.  When  the  best  it  can  do  is  discovered,  the 
employer  tries  to  make  the  result  the  standard  for  all 
the  other  workers.  If  he  can  do  this  unchecked,  he 
may  secure  all  the  immediate  advantages,  and  leave 
the  inconveniences  to  the  workers.  From  the  very 
beginning  of  the  machine  era,  the  trade  union  has 
had  to  struggle  against  this  tendency  to  force  the 
pace  of  the  average  workman,  by  the  tested  skill  of 
the  most  vigorous.  I  have  seen  in  a  New  England 
factory  a  machine  working  with  such  rapidity  as 
to  excite  wonder  that  any  one  could  be  induced  to 
follow  it  nine  hours  a  day.  Upon  inquiry,  the  fore- 
man told  me  how  it  had  been  managed.  "  This  in- 
vention," he  said,  "  is  hardly  six  months  old  ;  we  saw 
that  it  would  do  so  much  more  work  that  we  had  to 
be  very  careful  in  introducing  it.  We  picked  the 
man  you  see  on  it,  because  he  is  one  of  our  fastest. 
We  found  out  just  what  it  could  do  before  we  put 
it  into  the  room.  Now  they  will  all  see  what  it 
can  turn  out  when  it  is  properly  run."  "  Properly 
run  "  meant  to  him  run  at  its  very  highest  speed. 
This  was  the  standard  pressure  to  which  all  who 
worked  it  must  submit.  I  have  known  a  manu- 
facturer to  leave  a  strong  trade-union  shoe  town 
and  go  to  the  country  because  "  the  trade  union  try 
to  slow  up  my  machine.  If  I  attempt  to  get  all  the 
good  out  of  it,  they  are  bound  to  put  a  check  on  me 
somehow." 


1 92  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

When  the  New  England  shoe  laster  was  perfected 
a  few  years  since,  it  was  seen  by  employer  and  em- 
ployed that  if  put  to  general  use  it  would  strike  an 
almost  final  blow  to  the  strong  union  of  the  lasters. 
The  company  owning  the  invention  had  it  first  tested 
in  its  own  rooms  and  then  offered  to  put  it  into  the 
manufactory,  sending  its  own  man  to  run  it.  The 
union  in  Brockton  instantly  struck.  I  asked  a  local 
manufacturer  his  opinion.  He  answered :  "  I  think 
the  union  entirely  justified  in  this  strike.  If  I  were 
one  of  them,  I  would  be  at  the  front  of  it."  There 
was  doubtless  complete  legal  justification  in  selling 
(or  buying)  this  machine  together  with  the  lasting 
company's  man  to  run  it.  Why,  then,  should  this 
employer  acknowledge  that  the  strike,  which  worried 
him,  was  just?  It  was  because  he  was  large  enough 
and  fair  enough  to  see  that  it  was  asking  far  too 
much  of  an  old  and  established  labor  organization, 
to  see  this  new  invention  applied  under  conditions 
which  involved,  not  only  its  immediate  dissolution  as 
a  union,  but  a  rapid  displacement  of  many  members 
from  the  shops. 

If  it  is  to  be  assumed  that  men  can  be  treated 
exactly  as  machines  are  treated,  this  union  had  no 
ground  for  complaint  when  its  fate  was  decided. 
Its  members  had  merely  to  say :  "  Shoes  can  now 
be  lasted  automatically ;  we  are  out  of  the  game. 
Let  us  drop  our  tools  and  learn  a  new  trade."  This 
would  have  given  the  entire  benefit  of  the  invention 
at  once  to  its  owners,  to  the  manufacturer,  and  to  the 
consumers.  To  the  labor  organization  it  would  be 
said :  "  You  must  take  the  whole  sacrifice,  distressing 
as  it  is.  It  is  deplorable  that,  after  years  of  service, 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        193 

you  have  to  look  elsewhere  for  a  livelihood;  but 
progress  and  the  good  of  the  greater  number  demand 
it.  However,  shoes  will  eventually  be  somewhat 
cheaper,  and  this  compensation  will  be  yours."  If 
the  final  and  supreme  end  of  the  world's  toil  were 
cheapness  of  product,  the  routed  union  and  the  dis- 
placed laborers  would  have  to  take  this  counsel  and 
act  upon  it.  They  refuse  to  do  this  because  they  are 
human  beings  with  the  rights  which  their  humanity 
implies.  This  is  what  the  employer  meant  who 
said  the  strike  of  the  lasters'  union  was  just. 
He  saw  the  human  interests  at  stake  and  rightly 
balanced  them  against  certain  business  hindrances. 
He  thought  it  fairer  and  wiser  in  this  instance  to 
sacrifice  a  part  of  the  material  benefit  rather  than  the 
human. 

But  no  judgment  as  to  the  fairness  or  wisdom  of 
this  employer's  concession  is  quite  possible  until  it  is 
explained  what  the  union  proposed  to  do.  There  is 
a  sense  in  which  these  men  were  "  fighting  the  ma- 
chine." They  did  not  propose  to  stand  out  against 
its  introduction.  They  admitted  that  the  machine 
had  come  to  stay.  The  struggle  was  not  against  the 
machine,  but  wholly  over  the  conditions  of  its  use. 
They  asked  that  members  of  the  union  should  be 
chosen  to  run  it.  In  other  words,  that  the  union 
should  then  and  there  participate  in  the  advantages 
which  the  machine  brought  with  it.  The  public 
has  been  deceived  as  to  the  nature  of  the  strife, 
because  the  older  unions  did  fight  the  machine  as 
machine.  Now  and  then,  new  and  ignorant  unions 
do  this  still.  Often  unions  in  the  building  trades 
secure  a  local  monopoly  which  they  abuse  to  the 


194  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

point  of  absolutely  preventing  the  use  of  some  new 
invention.1 

Grave  as  these  exceptions  are,  they  are  exceptions, 
and  should  not  blind  us  to  the  main  facts.  Labor 
organizations,  as  a  whole,  aim  to  get  their  share  of 
utility  when  the  disturbing  invention  is  applied. 
They  do  not  propose  to  abolish  it,  or  even  to  hinder 
it,  if  applied  with  due  regard  to  labor  interests. 

I  believe  it  to  be  simple  justice  to  labor  organiza- 
tions to  admit  that  the  main  purpose  of  their  long 
contention  has  been  to  free  machinery  from  the  abuses 
of  a  too  narrow  capitalistic  interest.  It  was  of  course 
unavoidable  that  labor  should  work  toward  this  great 
end,  through  the  earlier  stages  of  unionism,  ignorant 
of  its  own  goal.  Its  history  and  its  literature  are 
nevertheless  filled  with  proofs  that  its  purpose,  deep 
and  unalterable,  has  been  to  force  machinery  into  its 
proper  place,  where  it  should  serve  man  rather  than 
enslave  him. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  weighty  questions  of  in- 
dustrial progress  and  of  the  rights  of  property  are 
raised  by  this  attitude  of  the  unions.  Yet  govern- 
ments and  municipalities  without  number  have  already 
taken  the  trade-union  ground,  and  many  first-rate 
business  men -act  on  the  assumption  that  the  union 
contention  (stripped  of  its  abuses)  is  just.  It  is  the 
essence  of  this  assumption  that  business  management 
should  take  on  a  more  democratic  character.  Or  to 

1  The  unions  pay  dearly  for  these  rank  abuses,  since  they  go  far  to 
justify  the  public  in  believing  that  labor  organizations  are  merely  mulish 
in  their  opposition  to  industrial  progress.  The  medieval  attitude  of 
certain  unions  at  the  national  capital  in  using  their  political  influence 
to  retain  clumsy  ^and  outworn  devices  has  brought  upon  the  cause  of 
labor  much  desenred  contempt. 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        195 

give  the  statement  another  form,  the  contest  of  organ- 
ized labor  takes  for  granted  what  is  essential  to  the 
spirit  of  partnership  in  the  business.  The  strident 
tones  in  which  the  harassed  employer  announces, 
"  This  is  my  business,  and  I  propose  to  have  no  dicta- 
tion how  it  is  to  be  carried  on,"  is  itself  a  sign  that 
the  unions  claim  a  sort  of  partnership,  however  absurd 
it  may  be.  On  the  other  hand,  the  grim  and  tenacious 
purpose  of  the  unions,  in  time  of  strike,  to  beat  back 
scab  labor,  has  the  same  implication  of  group  rights 
in  the  business.  Such  an  assertion  on  the  part  of 
labor  is  now  thought  to  be  monstrous.  I  wish  there- 
fore to  give  the  testimony  of  the  president  of  one  of 
the  best-known  corporations  in  the  United  States. 
His  opinions  are  submitted,  because  they  have  the 
authority  of  a  conspicuously  successful  business  man- 
agement, as  well  as  that  of  a  singularly  conscientious 
student.  For  years  he  has  been  as  eager  for  the  best 
literature  on  the  social  question  as  any  economic  in- 
structor. The  trade  unions  are  strong,  and  frankly 
recognized  by  the  management.  In  many  consulta- 
tions with  this  gentleman  he  has  told  me  how  he 
came  to  think  the  old  term  "  my  business  "  less  true 
than  the  term  "our  business."  "We  are  a  body  of 
directors,  stockholders,  and  workmen.  These  latter 
we  encourage  to  come  to  us,  buy  homes,  and  settle 
permanently  about  us.  In  a  very  real  sense  there  is 
a  kind  of  partnership,  though  of  course  in  no  legal 
sense.  The  rights  are  not  all  with  me  or  with  the  in- 
vestors. I  shall  fight  for  the  control,  because  that 
is  a  necessity.  Our  men  could  make  the  product, 
but  they  could  not  market  it.  The  buying  and  sell- 
ing is  at  present  beyond  their  capacity.  If  I  should 


196  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

give  them  the  business,  they  would  go  down  before 
our  rivals  in  a  year.  A  century  later,  when  the  work- 
men are  properly  educated,  I  should  probably  be  the 
hired  manager." 

When  I  pressed  the  question  about  the  nature  of 
the  partnership  which  he  recognized,  he  replied,  "  It 
is  a  partnership  in  the  sense  that  I  do  not  hold  them 
off  at  arm's  length.  They  have  a  right  '  to  dictate ' 
in  many  ways.  When  I  put  in  a  new  machine,  it 
usually  involves  a  change  in  the  wage  scale  among  a 
portion  of  the  men.  We  talk  this  over  together  and 
see  how  the  machine  can  be  adjusted  so  as  to  do  the 
least  possible  injury  to  the  group  which  is  affected  by 
it.  That  is  itself  an  acknowledgment  that  something 
like  a  partnership  exists  among  us.  Some  inventions 
would  enable  me  to  break  up  the  union.  Most  me- 
chanical improvements  of  any  importance  involve 
turning  off  men.  It  is  my  duty  to  talk  all  this  over 
with  them  and  make  them  see  it.  It  is  also  my  duty, 
when  one  set  of  relations  is  broken  up  by  a  new 
machine,  and  wages  and  conditions  changed,  to  do  all 
in  my  power  to  let  them  have  just  as  much  of  the 
advantage  and  as  little  of  the  harm  as  possible.  I 
have  found  thus  far,  that  with  proper  sympathy  from 
my  foreman,  we  can  redistribute  the  workers  in  such 
way  as  to  keep  the  peace  and  make  them  feel  that 
they  are  fairly  dealt  with." 

Here,  obviously,  is  the  temper  and  the  method  that 
would  save  forthwith  half  the  strikes  in  the  United 
States.  I  should  like  to  hang  beside  this  another 
picture.  It  is  that  of  an  industry  larger  and  not  less 
successful  than  the  other. 

Nowhere  more  than  in  this  business  does  machinery 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY         197 

play  a  greater  part.  Nowhere  does  one  invention 
follow  another  with  more  startling  rapidity.  As  a 
consequence,  nowhere  can  one  better  mark  the  splen- 
did achievements  in  augmenting  the  mass  of  products 
and  in  lowering  their  price  to  the  user.  It  was  in  part 
this  visible  plethora  of  ever  swelling  profits  that  roused 
discontent  among  the  more  intelligent  and  better  paid 
workmen.  The  strike  that  followed  was  ridiculed  be- 
cause started  by  the  "  labor  aristocrats."  After  the 
conflict  had  subsided,  I  heard  the  story  on  the  spot 
from  several  of  the  men  who  had  suffered  from  it. 
There  were  many  regrets  that  it  was  unwisely  begun 
and  unworthily  handled.  "  The  pay,"  said  one,  "  was 
good,  and  you  could  trust  what  they  told  you." 

"  Why,  then,  was  the  strike  ? "  From  the  most 
thoughtful  man  among  them  I  got  this  answer.  "  I 
think  now  the  strike  was  stupid,  but  I  shall  always 
think  there  was  cause  of  just  complaint  on  our  part. 
We  had  sacrificed  much  to  build  up  a  strong  labor 
organization,  but  we  were  as  helpless  as  any  belt  upon 
the  great  wheels.  Except  the  pick  of  the  men,  we 
were  liable  to  be  dropped  any  moment  without  a  word 
of  explanation.  New  contrivances  are  being  put  in  so 
fast,  wages  altered,  and  men  turned  off  exactly  as  if 
no  union  existed.  I  have  seen,  in  a  single  section 
of  my  union,  one  man  in  nine  thrown  out,  exactly  as 
if  they  were  screws  and  didn't  fit.  We  are  not  fools 
enough  to  object  to  the  new  inventions  they  put  in, 
but  they  have  no  business  to  put  them  in  without  the 
slightest  regard  to  us  as  human  beings.  They  have 
absolute  control  of  the  machinery  and  of  every  bit  of 
the  new  wealth  which  the  inventions  make  for  them. 
Millions  go  into  their  pockets  because  they  have  the 


198  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

power  to  take  it.  The  ordinary  unskilled  workman 
does  not  get  enough  to  make  it  safe  to  raise  a  family. 
A  dozen  men  have  palaces  and  money  to  burn,  while 
two-thirds  of  those  they  employ  will  not,  if  they  are 
wise,  try  to  buy  the  most  modest  home.  They  must 
live  in  cheap  tenements,  in  order  to  be  free  to  move  at 
a  moment's  notice.  Hundreds  of  men,  who  have  made 
part  payment  on  a  house,  have  lived  to  regret  it." 

With  the  foremost  active  manager  in  this  business 
I  talked  over  this  complaint  about  machinery.  "  But 
the  inventions,"  he  said,  "belong  to  us.  The  chief 
nuisance  of  a  trade  union  is,  that  they  want  to  haggle 
and  delay  over  every  bit  of  old  iron  we  throw  out.  It 
is  one  great  advantage  we  have  over  the  foreigner,  that 
we  can  put  in  the  invention  instantly,  and  not  fool  with 
a  trade-union  committee."  Here  again  the  heart  of 
the  struggle  is  laid  bare.  "  To  fool  with  a  trade-union 
committee "  meant  to  talk  over  the  conditions  of 
readjustment  brought  about  by  the  new  appliance. 
It  was  to  acknowledge  that  the  union  had  some  right 
to  discuss  the  changes  which  concerned  its  very  life 
as  an  organization.  The  aims  of  the  union  seem 
often  to  have  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  machinery, 
—  as  in  its  contention  for  an  eight-hour  day, — yet 
behind  all  is  the  one  great  purpose,  to  get  the  largest 
possible  share  of  the  product  which  labor  creates. 

Now  if  mechanical  invention  is  in  the  unrestricted 
possession  of  the  employer,  labor  feels  itself  baffled 
in  striving  for  all  the  wealth  it  creates,  or  believes  it 
creates.  The  constant  putting  in  of  new  machines, 
with  every  immediate  utility  passing  to  the  owner, 
seems  to  leave  the  laborer  on  the  hopeless  margin  of 
wage  dependence. 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        199 

In  the  last  business  referred  to,  the  masterful 
director  held  that  this  dependence  was  justified.  All 
thought  of  a  partnership  in  any  sense  was  scouted. 
In  the  instance  first  given  the  president  held,  on  the 
contrary,  that  labor  was  defrauded  unless  it  were 
frankly  admitted  to  discuss  the  changes  that  always 
follow  successful  and  disturbing  inventions.  It  is 
possible  that  the  uncompromising  method  of  absolute 
ownership,  and  not  less  absolute  dependence,  will  pre- 
vail, while  the  conception  of  a  partnership  will  fail. 
The  formula,  "  This  is  my  business,"  may  prove  vic- 
torious in  the  struggle,  while  the  fraternal,  "  Our 
business,"  vanishes  with  that  great  company  of  ami- 
able follies  in  which  mammon  worship  has  not  been 
the  sole  object. 

If  it  prove  true  that  we  have  too  little  good  will  and 
intelligence  to  organize  industrial  affairs  more  and 
more  along  the  lines  of  "  our  business,"  the  outlook 
is  not  cheerful.  It  would  mean,  to  a  certainty,  that 
every  turgid  agitation  which  justifies  a  miserable  dis- 
content is  fastened  upon  us  for  an  unknown  and 
ominous  future.  It  would  mean  a  gloomy  succession 
of  strikes,  dragging  in  their  train  those  fatal  excesses 
with  which  local  authorities  cannot  cope.  It  would 
mean  a  danger  darker  still  in  democratic  society  :  the 
soldier  equipped  with  weapons  of  death  led  out 
against  a  mass  of  his  fellow-citizens. 

II 

Only  the  nature  of  the  machine  problem  is  pre- 
sented in  this  and  the  previous  chapter.  The  specific 
solution  which  socialism  offers  will  be  considered 
in  the  pages  which  are  given  to  that  subject.  Mean- 


2OO  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

time,  a  more  detailed  illustration  is  necessary  to 
show  that  one  of  the  most  deadly  results  of  machine 
industry  need  not  go  without  a  remedy. 

Economic  phraseology  is  impotent  to  state  the  full 
gravity  of  these  misfortunes.  Those  that  manage 
the  trade-union  benefit  fund,  workers  in  the  Associ- 
ated Charities,  and  at  College  Settlements  know  what 
it  means  for  the  family  man  to  be  thrust  aside  before 
fifty.  It  is  here  among  the  weaker  and  older  work- 
ers that  the  completer  measure  of  the  ills  can  be 
taken.  It  is  a  common  answer  that  these  ills  may 
be  real,  but  that  they  are  temporary.  In  the  larger 
curves  of  time,  readjustments  are  made,  and  the  indi- 
vidual hurt  is  lost  in  the  general  good.  I  have  tried 
to  show  that  this  sleek  optimism  is  misleading.  The 
"long  run"  is  no  more  real  than  the  "short  run." 
With  only  the  "  long  run  "  in  view,  the  most  serious 
charges  against  machinery  are  still  unanswered. 
These  charges  are  concerned  with  the  perpetual  suc- 
cession of  "  short  run "  and  individual  hardships, 
whose  gathered  atoms  constitute  a  very  massive  and 
persistent  fact.  It  is  with  this  that  the  future  of 
voluntary  association  and  social  legislation  will  have 
to  do,  in  the  attempt  to  modify  the  struggle  for  exist- 
ence on  the  industrial  field.1 

But  first  let  us  see  in  a  given  instance  what  these 
short  run  phenomena  are.  I  was  allowed  recently  to 

1  "  The  most  conspicuous,  if  not  the  most  serious  distress  connected 
with  hard  times  is  found  in  those  lines  where  there  has  been  great 
duplication  of  machinery;  lines  where  the  machines  and  the  laborers 
together  are  far  more  able  to  supply  the  popular  demand  for  products 
and  devices  at  rates  which  will  keep  the  workman  and  his  family  alive." 
—  "The  suffering  from  this  source  is  terribly  severe."  —  President  Hadley, 
"  Political  Economy,"  p.  344. 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY       2OI 

attend  a  sitting  of  heads  of  departments  in  one  of  the 
larger  industries  of  the  United  States.  There  was 
one  hour  and  fifty  minutes  of  rapid  and  concise  dis- 
cussion upon  the  possible  economies  to  be  effected  in 
the  different  branches  of  the  business.  At  least  one- 
fourth  of  the  discussion  turned  upon  the  practica- 
bility of  discharging  unnecessary  labor.  Every 
superintendent  was  put  under  fire  of  general  criticism. 
He  must  show  that  he  was  producing  the  highest  re- 
sults with  the  least  expenditure  of  means.  "  You," 
said  the  chairman,  "  have  thirteen  men  on  such  a  job, 

F suggests  that  ten  men  could  do  it  as  well,  what 

do  you  say  ?  "  The  superintendent  appealed  to  made 
his  defence  or  admitted  that  two  or  three  men  could 
be  discharged. 

These  superintendents  represented  several  thousand 
workmen.  The  kindness  and  consideration  on  the 
part  of  the  employers  were  a  model  of  good  will.  So 
far  as  convenient,  other  positions  were  found  for  those 
displaced,  but  no  year  passed  in  which  "  several  hun- 
dred "  men  were  not  dismissed.  I  asked  an  owner 
active  in  the  business  what  became  of  the  discharged 
men.  He  answered  :  "  Of  course  we  can  know  noth- 
ing about  that.  Our  affairs  are  too  large  to  admit  of 
any  considerable  personal  supervision.  When  a  man 
begins  to  look  shaky,  we  have  to  let  him  go."  If 
large  numbers  of  men  are  worked  weekly  six  full 
days  of  ten  and  eleven  hours,  if  made  "  shaky  "  by 
long  and  special  service  at  minute  processes,  they  are 
replaced  at  forty  or  forty-five  years  of  age  by  young 
men ;  there  may  be  in  all  this  a  great  cruelty  to  the 
individual,  and  mischief  to  society.  Let  us  look  at 
this  last  evil.  Not  alone  the  quickened  speed  of 


202  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

machinery,  but  its  costlier  and  more  delicate  nature 
calls  for  an  operator  with  every  nerve  and  muscle  at 
their  best.  The  work  upon  much  of  the  swiftest 
machinery  can  be  rapidly  learned,  so  that  youth  is 
naturally  selected.  An  Eastern  shoe  manufacturer, 
visiting  Western  shoe  shops,  told  me  that  competition 
with  the  East  had  so  increased  that  he  determined  to 
know  the  reasons.  The  chief  thing  that  had  struck 
him  was  the  general  appearance  of  the  workman  as 
he  looked  through  the  Western  shops.  "  It  often 
seemed  to  me,"  he  said,  "as  if  I  were  in  a  high 
school.  The  older  hands  are  hard  to  keep  with  us, 
but  they  have  disappeared  altogether  out  here."  I 
have  a  series  of  photographs  representing  large  num- 
bers working  in  hat,  shoe,  and  garment  industries. 
The  group  effect  is  that  of  a  boy's  school  with  here  and 
there  a  man  in  middle  life.  I  have  heard  a  manufac- 
turer of  machines  say  that  among  the  greatest  changes 
he  had  known  in  forty  years  of  business  was  this  elimi- 
nation of  men  who  showed  the  least  sign  of  age. 
Another  employer  told  me :  "  It  isn't  so  much  that 
we  turn  off  men  when  we  see  the  gray  hair  and  spec- 
tacles, but  we  don't  any  longer,  as  we  used  to,  take 
on  men  of  forty.  The  fellow  of  eighteen  or  twenty, 
even  if  pretty  green,  can  be  quickly  taught,  and  then 
he  is  good  for  twenty  years.  Where  the  older  men 
have  special  skill,  or  some  quality  that  we  want,  they 
are  kept,  but  not  the  average  men."  It  is  these 
average  men  in  the  forties  and  early  fifties  that  are 
thrown  out  by  thousands  each  year  in  the  great  indus- 
tries. Many  take  lighter  routine  work  as  watchmen 
and  gatekeepers.  Many  turn  to  odd  jobs.  Many  are 
supported  by  their  children.  In  most  of  the  older 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        2O3 

businesses  there  is  honest  and  kindly  effort  made  by 
the  employer  to  find  work  about  the  premises.  This 
sense  of  responsibility  is  now  seen  to  disappear  en- 
tirely in  the  case  of  certain  trusts  that  have  replaced 
smaller  corporations.  A  Boston  man  who  sold  an  old 
family  business  to  the  trust  tells  me,  "  I  got  a  good 
price,  and  was  willing  to  stop,  but  I  have  one  un- 
pleasant regret,  the  kindly  personal  ties  I  always  had 
with  my  men  and  their  families  are  simply  wiped  out 
by  the  big  organization." 

The  separation  between  the  owners  of  fixed  capital 
and  the  laborer  has  long  been  noted ;  but  with  vast 
federated  plants,  managed  by  hired  intermediaries, 
it  is  unavoidable.  There  will  be  brave  attempts  to 
meet  the  difficulty  by  alluring  philanthropies,  by 
"  doing  something  for  the  workingmen."  If  merely 
philanthropic,  these  will  fail  as  they  deserve.  Be- 
nevolent schemes  that  bear  the  slightest  taint  of 
charity  have  at  last  got  the  contempt  of  the  intelli- 
gent wage-earners. 

Importunate  and  never  again  to  be  silenced,  their 
demand  is  that  they  get  their  benefits,  not  as  gifts  or 
favors,  but  as  recognized  rights.  Philanthropies  are 
a  dangerous  substitute  for  honest  wage  payment, 
shorter  working  time,  and  increased  influence  over 
the  conditions  of  the  labor  contract.  What  may  be 
called  the  Great  Bluff  of  our  time  is  to  put  gratui- 
ties and  benefactions  in  the  place  of  justice.  There 
is  no  donation,  however  gaudy,  that  can  fill  the  place 
of  justice.  The  attempt  of  the  ruling  class  to  do 
this  is  the  oldest  trick  in  history.  It  was  the  opin- 
ion of  a  Roman  emperor,  "  Magnificence  in  gifts 
may  deceive  even  the  gods."  The  crowd  could  then 


2O4  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

be  quieted  by  the  brutalities  of  a  pageant,  the  butch- 
eries in  the  arena,  by  fleets  of  stolen  grain  scat- 
tered among  the  people,  as  a  Tammany  heeler 
scatters  gifts  and  personal  kindnesses  before  the  elec- 
tion. We  are  at  least  civilized  so  far  that  we  demand 
more  decorum,  and  a  certain  humanizing  of  our  lar- 
gesses. They  must  bear  the  image  of  charity  and 
good-will  to  men.  They  must  be  educational,  artis- 
tic, and  in  all  ways  incentives  to  good  morals  and 
religion. 

Now  it  would  be  both  untrue  and  offensive  to  deny 
that  these  later  bounties  are  vast  improvements  upon 
the  free  circus  of  Caligula.  No  wise  man  would 
check  a  generous  instinct  of  any  multi-millionnaire. 
The  books,  pictures,  churches,  and  schools  take  their 
places  among  the  welfare  institutions  of  our  time. 
They  are  influences  which  deserve  the  honest  and 
grateful  approval  of  the  public. 

Yet  when  this  tribute  to  good  motive  and  good 
result  has  been  paid,  the  story  is  not  finished.  We 
are  hoodwinked,  unless  we  see  that  there  ought  to 
be,  and  possibly  may  be,  a  still  better  way  than  this 
to  acquire  individual  and  social  morality.  The  sturdy 
self-respect  in  any  community  that  should  build  its  own 
church,  school,  library,  dispensary, — paying  every 
honest  bill  as  it  goes, — would  show  an  exhilarating 
superiority  before  which  every  one  of  us  would  hasten 
to  pay  respect.  We  must  be  grateful  to  our  princely 
givers,  but  the  mistake  would  be  fatal  to  accept  this 
method  of  splendid  subsidies  as  a  finality.  What  we 
really  want  is  the  ability  and  the  instructed  will  to 
pay  our  own  bills,  even  if  the  pace  of  our  civilization 
halts  a  little.  I  know  a  group  of  Flemish  socialist 


MAN  AND  SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY       205 

working  men  and  women  who  slowly  bought  with 
hard-earned  money  two  thousand  well-selected  vol- 
umes for  their  common  library.  Not  ten  *  in  the 
entire  membership  ever  got  $2  a  day  in  wages. 
What  comparison  is  there  between  the  educational 
value  of  that  sacrifice  and  the  easy  acceptance  of  a 
building  choked  with  gift  books  ? 

The  unspoiled  instinct  in  the  labor  and  socialist 
movement  is  to  do  precisely  this  thing,  to  gain  com- 
petence and  leisure,  to  win  these  luxuries  for  itself. 
The  flair  of  this  instinct  is  unerring  when  it  scents 
danger  in  benefactions.  In  spite  of  noble  exceptions 
among  employers,  labor  knows  that  these  bounties 
may  confuse  the  relation  in  which  it  hopes  to  stand 
toward  the  employer.  There  will  be  much  mockery 
at  this  by  well-bred  people.  It  will  be  easy  to  mock, 
because  the  claim  is  so  obscure.  The  labor  phrase 
has  become  very  familiar,  "  We  will  have  justice,  not 
charity." 

The  public,  critics  and  students  alike,  all  find  fault 
with  this  use  of  the  word  because  of  its  vagueness,  yet 
it  can  be  made  perfectly  clear  what  "justice"  here 
means.  Last  year  I  visited  a  mill  to  which  many 
pretty  additions  had  been  made,  —  a  library,  resting 
room,  gymnasium,  etc.  The  manager  said,  "This 
ought  to  make  them  contented,  hadn't  it  ? "  I  asked 
a  friend,  who  is  a  stockholder  in  the  mill,  to  find  out 
for  me  just  what  the  men  and  women  working  there 
thought  of  these  new  sources  of  contentment.  The 
answer  I  got  was  this :  "  The  most  intelligent  ones 
tell  me  they  should  much  prefer  to  have  the  expense 
of  these  things  added  to  their  wages.  They  take  it 
good-naturedly  enough,  and  think  the  employer  is  a 


206  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

good  man,  but  they  seem  to  believe  he  will  in  the 
long  run  get  his  labor  a  little  cheaper,  and  can  at- 
tract a  certain  class  of  labor  in  these  ways."  This  is 
fast  coming  everywhere  to  be  the  feeling.  It  is  some- 
times bitter,  but  oftener  merely  cynical. 

Let  us  further  examine  this  claim,  in  what  is  per- 
haps the  most  tragic  element  connected  with  machine 
industry.  It  should  enable  us  to  see  first  what  labor 
means  by  "  justice  "  in  a  definite  instance ;  second,  a 
special  form  of  evil  connected  with  machinery ;  third, 
the  general  direction  of  more  immediate  and  conser- 
vative remedial  action. 

I  select  an  industry  which  has  reached  the  very 
highest  point  in  mechanical  evolution,  the  Carnegie 
Steel  Company.  Nowhere  have  I  seen  more  lordly 
and  generous  provision  for  those  who  are  maimed  at 
their  work.  I  found  instances  in  which  the  recom- 
pense was  four  times  as  high  as  the  greatest  amount 
ever  given  under  the  German  State  Insurance.  In 
my  surprise  at  these  amounts  I  asked  Mr.  Schwab, 
then  president  of  the  company,  for  more  information 
about  their  method.  He  replied,  "We  have  no 
method  except  to  see  to  it  that  our  own  injured  men 
are  generously  dealt  with."  In  a  letter  received  later 
from  Mr.  Schwab,  he  says :  "  If  a  man  is  injured  at 
our  works,  we  send  him  to  a  hospital  at  once,  where 
he  has  the  best  possible  medical  attention,  all  of 
which  we  pay  for.  If  he  has  a  family  to  be  taken 
care  of  during  his  enforced  idleness,  his  wages,  or 
part  of  them,  is  given  to  his  family  in  weekly  instal- 
ments until  his  recovery,  and  until  he  is  able  to  resume 
his  duties.  In  case  such  injury  makes  the  person 
unfit  for  his  usual  occupation,  something  suiting 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        20? 

his  physical  condition  is  found  for  him.  Many  of 
our  workmen  who  are  injured  are  foreigners,  and 
one  peculiar  feature  is  that  the  great  majority  of  in- 
juries is  to  workmen  of  foreign  nationality.  In  such 
cases  they  usually  want  to  return  to  their  own  coun- 
try, if  their  injury  is  a  serious  one.  When  this  is  the 
case,  we  provide  transportation  for  them  to  their 
homes  and  allow  them  sufficient  money  to  either  start 
them  in  some  small  business,  or  provide  a  place  for 
them  in  some  institution.  Where  the  accident  results 
fatally,  the  family  is  always  taken  care  of  financially. 
If  there  are  children,  provision  is  made  for  their 
education.  If  we  cannot  provide  means  by  which 
the  wife  can  take  care  of  herself,  we  allow  her  a 
pension,  or  house  to  live  in,  or  something  of  that 
description.  If  they  have  grown-up  children,  we 
provide  them  with  work.  In  brief,  each  case  must 
be  treated  independently.  We  have  no  fixed  rules." 
Here  is  benevolence  open-handed  and  in  its  least 
objectionable  form.  That  it  was  done  honorably  and 
in  good  faith  I  do  not  question. 

It  is  to  instances  of  this  character  that  those  point 
who  would  convince  us  that  voluntary  good  will  is  a 
surer  friend  to  labor  than  anything  which  the  law  can 
effect  in  the  form  of  legally  applied  justice. 

Some  of  the  best  Southern  mill-owners  show  much 
indignation  at  those  who  ask  for  legislation  to  check 
the  desecration  of  child  life  in  their  mills.  They  urge, 
instead,  that  voluntary  agreement  and  personal  good 
will  can  meet  the  evil  better  than  legislation.  That 
ancient  query,  "  Can  you  make  people  moral  by 
legislation  ? "  has  in  it  so  much  truth  for  a  whole 
class  of  social  evils  that  there  is  little  difficulty  in 


208  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

throwing  doubt  upon  all  law  as  an  aid  to  industrial 
betterment.  There  is  nothing,  however,  that  is  now 
better  known  than  the  power  of  legislative  enact- 
ment to  help  mightily  in  the  case  of  definite  industrial 
evils.  Child  labor  is  one  of  these.  Uniform  law  in- 
cludes the  weak  employer  and  the  bad  one.  The 
difficulty  is  rarely  with  the  best  and  strongest  em- 
ployers. They  can  afford  to  be  fair,  but  the  hard- 
pressed  employer  and  the  meaner  ones  will  take 
every  petty  advantage  which  public  indifference  and 
the  necessities  of  the  poor  throw  in  their  way.  It  is 
for  these  that  the  law  is  a  necessity. 

No  more  can  industrial  accidents  be  left  to  the 
generosity  of  exceptional  corporations.  Only  the 
rare  few  can  afford  to  imitate  the  Carnegie  Company. 
The  average  business  now  insures  against  accidents 
in  some  private  company,  whose  skilled  lawyer  knows 
every  device  to  beat  the  injured  workman  in  the 
courts.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  workman's  hurt 
is  known,  he  may  be  visitecf  by  some  attorney  who 
spurs  him  on  to  beat  the  company.  It  has  come  to 
be  mainly  a  blind  hunt  to  fix  personal  responsibilities 
under  industrial  conditions  which  make  this  impossible. 

An  injury  that  deprives  a  man  of  half  his  working 
power  should  be  recompensed  in  like  proportion. 
The  "  capitalizing  of  accidents,"  in  proportion  to  their 
disabling  results,  is  a  discovery  to  which  the  future 
will  give  far  higher  rank  than  we  now  accord  to  it. 
It  has  passed  the  stage  of  theory,  and  is  now  put 
to  practice  on  a  scale  that  leaves  no  doubt  as  to  its 
possibilities,  among  persons  willing  to  inform  them- 
selves of  the  facts.  The  principle  on  which  it  rests 
is  that  of  insurance  —  insurance  under  which  the  mass 


MAN   AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        2OQ 

of  unmerited  misfortunes  is  distributed  among  those 
who  can,  and  who  in  justice  ought  to  bear  it.  As  it 
comes  to  be  understood  in  its  application  to  the  ap- 
palling average  of  industrial  casualties,  it  will  be 
found  to  satisfy,  more  perhaps  than  any  other  remedy, 
the  growing  ethical  sense  of  society. 

In  the  anthracite  coal  fields  one  would  like  to  begin 
reform  by  applying  this  systematized  insurance  to 
that  frightful  list  of  stricken  laborers  that  are  now 
thrown  back  upon  themselves  or  their  families  with 
recompense  so  uncertain  and  niggardly  as  to  shock 
the  most  primitive  sense  of  social  justice. 

Let  us  now  see  in  a  given  case  what  the  workman 
means  by  asking  for  justice.  In  the  matter  of  indus- 
trial accident  he  asks  to  have  legal  rights  so  system- 
atized that  he  shall  receive  definite  and  calculable 
compensation  for  injuries. 

The  relation  of  industrial  accidents  to  machinery  is 
direct  and  obvious,  yet  neither  their  number  nor  their 
treatment  has  been  in  the  least  realized  in  any  com- 
munity until  a  long  and  arduous  propaganda  has 
been  made.  Previous  to  the  accident  insurance  in 
Germany  it  was  thought  that  there  might  be  thirty 
or  forty  thousand  injuries  due  to  machinery  that 
would  be  covered  by  the  insurance.  The  first  inves- 
tigation showed  three  times  this  number ;  when  the 
investigation  became  more  complete,  six  times  the 
number.  It  was  found  that  in  many  dangerous  call- 
ings the  accidents  were  concealed  from  the  outside 
world.  But  for  the  forced  public  regulation  of  rail- 
roads, we  should  have  no  hint  of  the  full  tragedy  that 
goes  on,  day  by  day,  in  the  United  States.  The 
authoritative  statement  of  the  Commission  for  1901 


210  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

reads  as  follows :  "  The  total  number  of  casualties  to 
persons  on  account  of  railway  accidents,  as  shown 
for  the  year  ending  June  30,  1901,  was  61,794,  the 
number  of  persons  killed  having  been  8455  and  the 
number  injured  53,339.  Of  railway  employees,  2675 
were  killed  and  41,142  were  injured."1 

From  railway  machinery  alone,  8455  killed  and 
53,339  injured  in  a  single  year.2  One  has  to  read  and 
reread  these  figures  before  their  grewsome  significance 
is  in  the  least  clear.  If  we  add  the  mining,  iron,  and 
lumbering  industries, — portions  of  which  are  more  dan- 
gerous than  the  railroad,  —  some  conception  is  possible 
of  the  mutilated  life  due  to  machinery  as'it  is  now  run. 

Yet  if  all  the  cunning  and  sympathy  of  the  race 
were  exhausted  in  the  attempt,  this  slaughter  could 
not  be  stopped.  It  can  be  greatly  curtailed  by  im- 
provements like  the  automatic  car  coupler,  and  by 
throwing  pecuniary  responsibility  upon  the  owners. 
Wherever  the  slaughter  is  sudden  and  dramatic 
enough  to  shock  the  public,  —  as  in  the  machinery  of 
mining  and  transportation,  —  it  has  become  possible 
to  compel  the  ownership  to  pay  heavily  for  its  ac- 
cidents. In  countless  lesser  and  private  industries, 

1  Commenting  on  this  report,  the  New  York  Evening  Post  says  : 
"  In  reverting  to  their  figures,  it  will  be  interesting  to  compare  them 
with  the  last  report  of  casualties  in  the  British  army  in  South  Africa 
during  the  recent  war,  which,  it  will  be   remembered,  lasted  nearly 
three  years :  — 

Killed  on  American  railways,  three  years  ending  June  30, 

1900 21,847 

Killed  (British  forces)  during  South  African  war  (including 

deaths  from  disease 22,000 " 

2  Fairness  requires  that  discrimination  should  be  made  between  the 
casualties  of  employees  and  the  casualties  to  others  called  by  the  rail- 
road "  trespassers." 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY         211 

where  the  blows  fall  singly  and  silently,  as  deaths  in 
a  hospital,  though  the  numbers  may  be  as  10  to  I 
greater,  there  is  thus  far  in  the  United  States  only 
the  crudest  attempt  at  fair  dealing  with  the  victims  or 
their  families. 

From  a  group  of  several  hundred  cases,  of  the  type 
collected  in  the  Bulletins  of  the  New  York  Depart- 
ment of  Labor,  I  give  a  commonplace  instance.  A 
Swede  working  with  a  derrick,  while  removing  an 
old  building  in  Chicago,  was  struck  by  a  falling  beam, 
which  broke  his  arm  in  three  places.  He  settled  for 
the  sum  of  $80.  His  son,  a  waiter  in  the  Union 
League  Club,  told  me  a  year  later  that  of  this  amount 
$68  went  to  the  doctors.  He  was  still  unable  to  work, 
and  never  again  could  have  free  use  of  his  arm.  It 
is  the  commonest  case  of  taking  advantage  of  the 
laborer's  ignorance.  He  could  have  secured  counsel 
to  fight  the  case  in  court.  But  for  this  he  was  too  ill 
informed. 

In  most  of  our  states  our  method  of  indemnifying 
industrial  accidents  is  as  crude  as  it  is  abnormal. 
Justice  requires  some  approach  to  equality  of  proced- 
ure, but  a  crushed  hand  may  bring  nothing  to  the 
sufferer,  it  may  bring  $50,  it  may  bring  $500. 
Whether  it  bring  anything,  much  or  little,  depends,  for 
the  great  majority  of  workmen  in  this  country,  upon 
the  most  incalculable  chances. 

We  still  act  as  if  in  an  age  of  primitive  tools.  When 
every  man  controlled  a  simple  tool,  like  hammer  and 
plane ;  when  it  did  not  move  except  when  he  willed 
and  as  he  willed,  it  was  not  unnatural  to  hold  him 
responsible  for  incidental  hurts.  It  was  not  unnatu- 
ral that  if  one  workman  injured  another  it  should  be 


212  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

held  to  be  the  fault  of  that  workman  and  not  of  the 
employer.  There  was  then  some  sense  in  the  for- 
mula, "The  responsibility  of  the  fellow-servant." 
From  the  older  and  simpler  conditions,  rules  like 
"common  employment"  have  come  down  into  the 
age  of  huge  instruments  driven  by  the  powers  of 
steam  and  electricity.  The  difference  is  as  great 
as  that  of  breaking  boulders  by  fire  or  vinegar  and 
blasting  with  dynamite.  During  the  long  experi- 
mental struggle  to  harness  electricity,  workmen  in 
the  United  States  daily  fall  to  the  street,  withered  by 
the  touch  of  a  live  wire.  What  in  common  has  this 
manner  of  death  with  the  older  accidents  when  labor 
moved  and  controlled  the  simple  tools  ? 

That  the  corporation  and  every  stockholder  in  it 
should  escape  responsibility,  by  allowing  a  lawyer  to 
plead  ancient  saws,  shows  that  the  strong  and  suc- 
cessful of  our  age  have  as  little  taste  for  justice  as 
their  ancestors.  It  is  the  scale  and  complexity  of 
modern  machine  industry  that  has  made  the  old  rules, 
like  the  "  common  employment,"  "  contributory  negli- 
gence," grotesque  in  their  unfitness  to  present  facts. 
What  the  French  fitly  call  the  "  accident  anonyme," 
the  accident  over  which  the  victim  has  no  control,  has 
come  to  be  a  terrible  reality  in  machine  industry. 

In  "common  employment,"  under  this  rule,  the 
laborer  was  said  to  contract  with  his  employer  to  take 
all  the  usual  risks  that  were  incident  to  the  business. 
Thus  the  employer  so  far  escaped  responsibility.  One 
of  the  commonest  of  these  risks  was  an  accident 
brought  about  by  the  carelessness  of  a  fellow-laborer. 
Early  in  the  century,  when  machinery  was  of  the 
simplest  sort ;  when  the  employer  was  the  owner  and 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        213 

lived  among  his  workmen,  the  doctrines  of  "  common 
employment "  and  "  contributory  negligence  "  were 
intelligible.  In  a  modern  mill,  factory,  mine,  or  in 
railroad  service,  they  are  as  much  out  of  date  as  a 
distaff,  or  as  bleeding  for  miscellaneous  diseases. 
The  cause  of  accidents  in  these  days  of  great  ma- 
chinery and  of  the  army  of  subcontractors,  becomes 
so  obscure  that  the  law,  many  years  since,  became 
charged  with  a  casuistry  as  subtle  as  that  of  the 
scholastics.  The  cases  are  filled  with  metaphysical 
terms  like  the  following:  "causa  causans"  "  principal 
cause,"  " determining  cause,"  "proximate  cause,"  and 
"cause  directly  contributory"  to  the  accident.  I 
have]  heard  the  dean  of  one  of  our  law  schools  call 
this  common  legal  casuistry  "  rubbish  of  the  worst 
sort,"  as  applied  to  the  facts  and  exigencies  of  the 
present-day  industry.  Most  civilized  communities 
outside  of  America  have  already  made  the  same 
acknowledgment  by  framing  new  laws  that  mark  an 
era  in  a  juster  social  legislation. 

Switzerland  came  first  in  1881,  Germany  in  1884, 
Austria  in  1887,  Norway  in  1894,  and  England, 
France,  Italy,  and  Denmark  in  1898.  One  and  all 
have  taken  the  first  definite  steps  toward  the  organiza- 
tion of  justice  in  this  matter  of  industrial  accidents. 

In  an  entire  day's  discussion  of  this  subject  in  1901, 
before  the  American  Social  Science  Association  in 
Washington,  the  judgment  was  practically  unanimous 
that  our  methods  of  recompensing  accidents  by  ma- 
chinery are  as  clumsy  as  they  are  unjust.  There  is 
in  the  United  States  no  well-informed  student  of  this 
question  known  to  me  who  has  in  general  a  different 
opinion. 


214  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

The  justification  which  a  layman  feels  in  using 
strong  language  about  this  inhumanity,  is  that  wher- 
ever the  facts  have  had  thorough  discussion,  both 
lawyers  and  politicians  of  highest  eminence  agree  in 
condemning  conditions  like  those  now  existing  in  the 
United  States.  It  was  of  these  that  Sir  Frederick 
Pollock  said,  "  I  think  the  doctrine  of  the  American 
and  English  courts  is  bad  law  as  well  as  bad  policy." 
Of  these  same  conditions  (the  English  act  of  1880) 
Mr.  Asquith  used  the  words,  "a  scandal  and  a  re- 
proach to  the  legislature,  an  elaborate  series  of  traps 
and  pitfalls  for  the  unwary  litigant,  and  producing 
litigation  which,  in  proportion  to  its  difficulty  and 
cost,  is  absolutely  barren  of  result."  Lord  Salis- 
bury and  Mr.  Chamberlain  have  both  used  language 
scarcely  less  severe.  When  the  discussion  began  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  twenty  years  ago,  scores  of 
able  men  hotly  defended  these  laws.  It  is  now  said 
that  no  first-rate  man  in  the  house  will  even  attempt  a 
defence.  At  the  international  congresses  for  the  dis- 
cussion of  accident  insurance,  the  part  which  "  com- 
mon employment "  has  played  in  our  legislature  has 
invariably  elicited  surprise  and  disapproval. 

Mr.  Willoughby,  in  his  admirable  book  on  "  Work- 
ingmen's  Insurance,"  at  the  end  of  the  chapter  on  this 
subject  in  the  United  States,  puts  the  case  of  our  own 
backwardness  in  these  words  :  "  It  would  be  difficult 
to  think  of  another  field  of  social  or  legal  reform  in 
which  the  United  States  is  so  far  behind  other  nations. 
The  most  depressing  feature  of  the  situation  lies  in 
the  fact  that  the  very  principles  involved  in  this 
gradual  evolution  from  the  limited  liability  of  em- 
ployers to  that  of  the  compulsory  indemnification  by 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        215 

them  of  practically  all  injured  employees,  are  as  yet 
not  even  comprehended  in  the  United  States." 

Nowhere  can  the  ethics  of  social  responsibility  be 
studied  to  such  advantage  as  among  these  accidents 
and  deaths  due  to  the  manner  and  places  in  which 
complicated  machinery  is  now  used. 

The  United  States  stands  preeminent  for  its  inven- 
tive faculty.  Nowhere  has  the  great  machinery  de- 
veloped so  swiftly  or  taken  such  perfect  and  effective 
form.  Nowhere  has  a  race  profited  so  greatly  and  so 
continuously  by  the  cheapened  product  due  to  me- 
chanical devices.  It  would  be  a  very  elementary 
form  of  justice  for  a  public  so  enriched  to  say :  "  We 
get  the  good  of  it ;  our  incomes  and  our  luxuries  in- 
crease with  every  new  embodiment  of  the  inventor's 
cunning.  We,  who  are  loaded  with  extra  gifts,  come 
off  unscathed,  yet  the  vast  processes  which  work  for 
our  comfort  are  followed  by  a  fatal  train  of  blighting 
injuries.  Ought  not  we  who  get  the  good,  to  see  to  it 
that  the  inevitable  death  or  mutilation  should  be 
decently  recompensed  ? "  Yet  we  as  the  nation  which 
receives  most  from  the  machines  make  the  most  nig- 
gardly return  to  the  victims.  Semi-public  corpora- 
tions have  been  compelled,  in  a  degree,  to  do  their 
duty.  Here  and  there  private  corporations  act  hon- 
orably toward  their  injured  workmen,  but  the  general 
mass  of  crippled  life  in  our  country  is  indemnified,  if 
at  all,  with  a  meanness,  with  a  fickleness  and  uncer- 
tainty that  is  a  reproach  to  our  civilization.  No  civ- 
ilized nation  can  match  our  hot  pace  and  our  careless 
disregard  of  human  life.  We  insist  that  the  hurry  is 
but  a  name  for  enterprise  and  progress,  and  that  it  is 
unavoidable  if  we  would  lead  the  world  in  industrial 


2l6  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

achievement.  If  this  be  so,  let  justice  be  done  to  the 
victims  of  all  this  greatness. 

The  principle  through  which,  at  least,  a  beginning 
of  justice  is  possible,  is  now  clearly  worked  out  for 
our  instruction.  It  has  been  developed  from  the 
same  causes  in  Switzerland,  France,  England,  and 
Germany.  The  facts  of  industrial  accidents  were 
first  exhaustively  studied  with  a  view  to  uniform  and 
equitable  procedure.  The  illustration  from  Germany 
is  best  only  because  the  investigation  of  their  acci- 
dents has  been  most  systematic  and  thorough.  When 
Germany  had  our  "  Employers'  Liability  "  as  it  now 
exists  in  most  of  our  states,  she  had  what  we  have, 
endless  and  expensive  haggling  in  the  courts  with 
every  extreme  of  uncertainty  to  employer  and  em- 
ployed, as  to  amount  of  indemnity.  It  was  found 
there,  as  with  us,  that  perpetual  injustice  resulted 
because  of  the  laborer's  ignorance  in  using  the  com- 
mon law.  The  first  German  authority  upon  this  sub- 
ject, Dr.  Zacher,  says :  "  The  heavy  burden  of  proof 
laid  on  the  party  seeking  redress  almost  frustrated 
the  beneficent  intentions  of  the  measure.  The  limita- 
tion of  responsibility  to  cases,  in  which  the  blame 
rested  with  managers  or  overseers,  left  uncovered  not 
only  cases  originating  from  personal  fault  or  neglect, 
but  likewise  that  large  class  of  injuries  caused  by 
chance  or  fellow-workmen.  The  inability  of  the  re- 
sponsible parties  to  pay  an  indemnity,  often  compelled 
the  applicant  to  fall  back  upon  public  charity,  and 
the  increasing  number  of  lawsuits  seriously  embit- 
tered the  relations  between  employers  and  employed." 

Twenty  years'  experience  under  the  German  act  has 
made  it  clear  that  more  than  half  of  the  industrial  ac- 


MAN  AND   SOCIETY    VERSUS  MACHINERY        217 

cidents  are  neither  the  fault  of  the  employer  nor  of 
the  employed.  They  come  with  the  regularity  of  the 
tides,  and  can  be  dealt  with  by  exact  actuarial  methods. 
This  evidence  had  a  powerful  influence  in  England  in 
their  decision  to  stop  this  hunt  for  impossible  personal 
blames,  and  put  this  whole  matter  where  it  belongs, 
—  upon  a  basis  of  carefully  regulated  insurance.  The 
long  and  searching  discussion  of  this  problem  in  eight 
countries  is  practically  a  unit  upon  this  point.  The 
expense  of  accidents  (barring  cases  of  gross  negli- 
gence) should,  like  insurance,  be  thrown  upon  the 
costs  of  the  business.  The  general  body  of  consumers 
must  then,  in  the  long  run,  when  readjustments  are 
made,  pay  the  bill  for  the  disabilities  incident  to  pro- 
duction. This  ends,  once  for  all,  a  world  of  petty 
personal  bickering  that  is  wasteful  from  every  point 
of  view. 

One  of  the  first  results  of  the  study  was  to  show 
how  easily  the  employer  escaped  responsibility  under 
the  rules  which  came  down  from  primitive  industry. 
A  group  of  15,970  "grave  accidents,"  published  by 
the  Imperial  Bureau  in  1887,  reads  as  follows:  — 

3156  due  to  fault  of  employer,  or  19% 

4094  due  to  fault  of  victim,  or  25  % 

711  due  to  fault  of  both,  or    4% 

524  due  to  fault  of  fellow-workmen,  or   3% 

6931  due  to  risks  which  were  incident  to  the  employment,  or  43% 

554  due  to  unknown  cause,  or    3% 

Here  about  three-quarters  of  the  employers  would 
escape  under  the  old  rules  as  they  are  frequently 
interpreted  in  the  United  States.  These  figures  are 
not  exceptional.  The  Swiss  tables  showed  that  less 
than  eighteen  per  cent  of  accidents  could  be  proved 


218  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

against  the  employer.  In  Belgium  it  was  shown  that 
the  old  law  (like  our  own)  left  three-fifths  of  the 
injured  workmen  without  legal  rights  of  indemnity. 

Just  as  clearly  do  these  preliminary  studies  in 
social  justice  bring  out  other  startling  phases  of 
cruelty  on  the  one  hand  and  of  immediate  possible 
improvement  on  the  other. 

To  see  that  one  kind  of  work  has  a  per  capita 
risk  of  accident  or  death,  eleven  times  greater  than 
another,  in  which  the  wages  are  quite  as  high,  shows 
what  unfair  burdens  we  are  willing  to  thrust  upon 
the  weak  and  ignorant.  The  insurance  of  the  Ger- 
man type  now  compels  the  business  with  extra  risks 
to  pay  an  insurance  proportioned  to  the  peril.  If 
unusual  casualties  attend  any  business,  it  should  bear 
the  burden.  The  old  theory  that  hazardous  toil 
receives  higher  pay,  is  now  seen  to  have  no  general 
truth  whatever.  It  is  like  the  conjured  objection  to 
the  ten-hour  day  in  the  English  mills,  that  the  profits 
were  made  in  the  last  half  hour  and  "therefore  the 
working  day  could  not  be  shortened." 

Again  it  appears  in  many  industries,  where  the 
nervous  strain  is  great,  that  the  ratio  of  accidents 
rises  in  the  tired  hour  before  the  work  is  stopped. 
There  are  industries  in  which  the  accidents  are  twice 
as  numerous  in  the  last  hour  of  the  day  as  they  are  in 
the  hour  following  dinner.  The  bearing  of  this  upon 
a  shortened  day  in  these  industries  is  obvious. 

These  illustrations  of  the  danger  and  loss  side  by 
no  means  exhaust  the  account,  but  they  fairly  show 
that  if  the  service  of  machinery  is  great,  the  maiming 
effects  of  it  are  also  great. 

No  sane  person,  however,  suggests  that  machinery 


MAN   AND   SOCIETY   VERSUS  MACHINERY        219 

be  either  destroyed  or  discontinued,  not  even  the 
wrathful  Ruskin,  if  he  is  carefully  read.  Machinery 
is  with  us  doing  our  work,  and  it  is  here  to  stay. 
It  is  strictly  the  creature  of  man's  devising  brain. 
Not  a  cog,  a  lever,  or  a  wheel  that  was  not  a  thought 
before  it  was  a  thing.  There  is  no  enginery  how- 
ever vast  that  is  not  thus  a  creature  of  man's  mind. 
The  first  of  all  questions  about  machinery  is  how 
far  we  'shall  allow  this  by-product  of  our  thinking 
to  become  our  master. 

No  one  will  claim  that  the  evil  is  primarily  in  the 
machine.  Such  evils  as  there  are,  must  be  in  the 
ways  in  which  we  allow  it  to  be  used.  We  permit 
it  often  to  be  badly  placed,  recklessly  run,  too  irre- 
sponsibly owned  or  put  to  specialized  uses  that  dwarf 
the  operator. 

These  are  the  evils  with  which  the  coming  time 
has  to  cope.  The  most  obstinate  of  them  will  be 
met  only  by  a  uniform,  well-ordered  extension  of 
factory  and  social  legislation  of  the  types  illustrated 
by  child  labor  and  industrial  accidents. 

It  is  now  pretty  safe  to  say  one  thing  to  those 
who  assert  that  this  uniformity  cannot  be  reached 
because  separate  states  will  stand  out  in  order  to 
secure  every  competitive  advantage.  Monopolized 
privilege  in  the  United  States  will  almost  certainly 
engender  abuses  which  public  opinion  will  not  con- 
tinue to  endure.  Almost  certainly  we  shall  have 
(as  in  the  great  strike  of  1894  and  the  coal  strike 
of  1902)  trouble  profound  enough  to  create  a  new 
habit  of  mind  in  the  American  people.  Through 
these  extreme  disorders  and  inconveniences  the  public 
will  learn  its  hard  lesson  of  demanding  those  activi- 


22O  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

ties  of  government  that  will  at  last  give  us  a  body  of 
uniform,  industrial,  and  social  legislation  that  will 
stand  in  some  real  relation  to  the  actual  facts  of  an  in- 
dustrial life  that  is  no  longer  an  affair  of  state  boun- 
daries, but  of  one  common  national  area.  Not  to  do 
this,  means  a  still  more  rapid  development  of  socialism. 
Meantime  the  questions  raised  by  machinery  have  to 
be  faced,  one  by  one,  until  they  are  better  understood. 
No  single  illustration  can  better  bring  out  these  facts 
as  they  bear  upon  the  social  question  than  the  tragedy 
of  industrial  accidents  and  the  whimsical  incongruities 
of  our  present  legal  methods.  The  average  of  inju- 
ries is  appalling  in  extent,  but  possibly  one-half  of 
them  are  due  to  avoidable  causes.  Those  that  cannot 
be  avoided,  can  be  honestly  and  humanely  recom- 
pensed. It  is  not  destiny  that  the  casualties  from 
coupling  cars  in  1889  should  have  been  5235.  If 
quarrying  stone  is  fifteen  times  as  hazardous  to  life 
and  limb  as  making  paper  or  cloth,  it  is  not  fate  that 
the  extra  peril  should  be  borne  by  the  quarrymen  with- 
out some  corresponding  compensation.  It  has  been 
proved  in  theory  and  in  practice  that  a  rough  money 
equivalent  can  be  given.  It  is  not  fixed  by  nature 
that  men  should  operate  machinery  so  many  hours 
and  in  conditions  so  unwholesome  that  the  springs  of 
life  are  exhausted  before  life  is  half  lived  out. 

For  these  and  kindred  evils,  traceable  to  machin- 
ery, as  now  owned  and  operated,  socialism  appears 
upon  the  scene  with  proposals  of  its  own. 

It  is  a  fundamental  assumption  of  the  socialists, 
and  more  and  more  of  organized  labor,  that  if  the 
"  means  of  production  "  were  controlled  by  the  com- 
munity, rather  than  by  private  persons  and  corpora- 


MAN  AND  SOCIETY  VERSUS  MACHINERY        221 

tions,  the  evils  now  connected  with  machinery  would 
pass  away.  It  is  thus  implied  that  the  evils  are 
inherent  not  in  the  machinery,  but  in  the  nature  of 
its  ownership  and  control.  The  collectivist  therefore 
asks  that  the  state  take  over  the  mines  and  the 
machinery  necessary  to  work  them.  Let  it  give  a 
minimum  living  wage  to  every  worker,  with  hours 
not  exceeding  eight ;  in  a  word,  the  people  have 
power  to  use  machinery  as  it  will.  First,  enlarge  the 
public  possession  of  this  machinery,  then  the  com- 
munity shall  have  the  profits,  and  what  is  perhaps  a 
greater  good,  it  shall  use  the  machinery  for  the  com- 
mon weal.  It  has  yet  to  be  proved  whether  or  not 
socialism  can  make  this  promise  good.  New  Zealand 
and  Australia  have  adopted  this  policy  of  using  rail- 
roads, telegraph,  telephone,  etc.,  first  for  social  service. 
Strictly  business  and  dividend  reasons  are  consciously 
subordinated  to  this  higher  interest.  We  watch  this 
daring  venture  anxious  to  know  if  the  new  principle 
will  work.  Can  they  work  this  machinery  through 
politics  first  for  the  public  good,  without  loss  of 
efficiency  and  a  too  heavy  burden  of  costs?  If  this 
can  be  done,  it  will  mark  an  era  in  social  improvement. 
While  we  await  results,  our  task  with  the  correspond- 
ing machinery  is  chiefly  that  of  "  regulation " ;  to 
subject  these  forces  to  such  control  that  human  and 
social  interests  shall  not  be  too  much  endangered. 
In  many  countries  the  proof  is  now  complete  that  uni- 
form legal  control  can  work  incalculable  social  bene- 
fits. The  limits  of  this  control  and  its  efficiency  as 
compared  with  the  collectivist  principle  can  be  known 
only  through  that  further  experience  that  is  now 
rapidly  accumulating  for  our  guidance. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE    MASTER   PASSION   OF    DEMOCRACY 
I 

Illusions 

THE  story  of  the  social  unrest  cannot  be  told  with- 
out reference  to  those  motives  which  underlie  its 
practical  methods.  At  the  heart  of  all  socialistic 
aspiration  is  some  conception  of  equality.  At  the 
heart  of  the  larger  labor  movement  is  the  race  long- 
ing for  a  society  in  which  at  least  the  spirit  of  equal- 
ity shall  be  realized.  Most  radical  remedies  are  only 
means  to  this  end.  Beyond,  and  deeper  than  all 
the  machinery  of  social  reconstruction,  is  this  master 
passion  of  democracy. 

Henry  George  did  not  give  his  life  for  a  system  of 
taxation.  He  worked  for  thirty  years  with  rare  and 
high  devotion  to  convert  the  world  to  his  "  single 
tax,"  but  wholly  beyond  this  was  the  thing  he  cared 
for ;  the  larger  equality  which  he  believed  the  single 
tax  would  usher  in.  There  is  no  sect  of  socialists  of 
which  this  is  not  likewise  true.  Their  several 
schemes  stand  only  as  means  to  this  larger  end  of 
a  more  equal  life.  Is  this  dream,  as  so  many  tell  us, 
a  discredited  absurdity  ? 

Those  who  have  written  most  persuasively  in  favor 
of  equality  have  been  moved  to  expression  by  the 


THE   MASTER   PASSION   OF  DEMOCRACY          223 

violent  and  flaunting  inequalities  amidst  which  they 
lived.  Rousseau  and  Godwin,  the  aristocratic  St. 
Simon  and  the  democratic  Fourier,  down  to  recent 
writers,  like  Zola  and  Tolstoi,  are  sore  and  angry 
before  the  fact  that  those  who  have  too  little  and 
those  who  have  too  much  so  jostle  each  other  along 
the  highway  of  a  common  life.  Almost  more  is  it 
a  source  of  irritation  that  those  who  are  not  in  want 
are  prone  to  excuse  these  extremes  as  natural,  un- 
avoidable, and  even  desirable.  Godwin  wrote  this 
sentence,  "The  human  mind  is  incredibly  subtle  in 
inventing  an  apology  for  that  to  which  its  inclination 
leads." 

The  prejudice  of  interest  and  of  temperament 
rarely  shows  itself  with  more  complacent  confidence 
than  in  most  discussions  on  that  world-old  dream 
of  the  democracy,  equality.  In  the  days  when  the 
tory  hatred  of  Gladstone  was  so  acrid  that  it  was 
thought  to  be  bad  form  to  mention  his  name  at 
a  dinner  table,  I  asked  a  wise  Englishman  what 
reason  could  be  given  for  a  bitterness  so  excessive. 
"Those  who  hate  him,"  he  answered,  "  cannot  give 
reasons,  or  if  they  do,  there  is  no  consistency  among 
them.  You  will  notice  that  vituperation  takes  the 
place  of  argument.  When  Gladstone  is  gone,  it  will 
be  seen  by  all  that  his  rank  is  without  dispute  among 
the  half  dozen  of  the  greatest  statesmen  England  has 
produced.  My  own  interpretation  of  the  abhorrence 
in  which  the  well-bred  world  professes  to  hold  him, 
is  that  it  sees  in  him  a  very  terrible  enemy  to  those 
property  rights  on  which  our  social  inequality  rests. 
Not  that  Gladstone  means  this,  or  is  conscious  of 
it,  but  his  enemies  see  in  him  a  most  redoubtable 


224  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

champion  of  the  coming  democracy,  and  hate  him 
accordingly."  This  exposition  may  be  defective,  but 
it  illustrates  the  unreasoning  passions  that  are  kin- 
dled when  interests  for  which  men  most  care  are  put 
in  danger. 

No  subject  is  more  beset  by  disturbing  bias  or 
class  jealousy  than  equality.  Much  of  the  literature 
that  extenuates  inequalities  exhibits  a  certain  irri- 
tation, as  if  the  author  were  arguing  against  one 
who  had  affronted  him.  This  perversity  of  misun- 
derstanding is  epitomized  in  the  Lincoln-Douglas 
debates.  Lincoln  came  again  and  again  to  the  famous 
equality  clause  of  the  Declaration,  "All  men  are 
created  equal,"  etc.  From  the  astute  Douglas  to  the 
pettiest  demagogue  of  proslavery  politics,  Lincoln 
was  harassed  because  of  his  defence  of  equality. 
With  his  incomparable  lucidity  of  statement,  he  tells 
the  public  what  he  means.  He  does  not  mean  equal 
in  all  respects ;  color,  stature,  moral  and  intellectual 
gifts,  are  indefinitely  variable,  but  deeper  than  this 
difference  lies  a  basis  of  equality,  absolute  and  im- 
pregnable. "There  is,"  said  Lincoln,  "no  reason  in 
the  world  why  the  negro  is  not  entitled  to  all  the 
natural  rights  enumerated  in  the  Declaration  of 
Independence ;  the  right  to  life,  liberty,  and  the 
pursuit  of  happiness.  I  hold  that  he  is  as  much 
entitled  to  these  as  the  white  man.  I  agree  with 
Judge  Douglas  that  he  is  not  my  equal  in  many 
respects  —  certainly  not  in  color,  perhaps  not  in 
moral  or  intellectual  endowment.  But  in  the  right  to 
eat  the  bread,  without  the  leave  of  anybody  else, 
which  his  own  hand  earns,  he  is  my  equal,  and  the 
equal  of  Judge  Douglas,  and  the  equal  of  every  living 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          225 

man."  In  passages  like  this,  it  is  made  fearlessly  clear 
that  the  great  democrat  is  not  arguing  for  impossible 
equalities;  clear,  that  he  understands,  as  well  as  his 
opponent,  what  a  gamut  of  superior  and  inferior  quali- 
ties inhere  in  the  race,  and  forever  will  inhere.  But 
these  repeated  explanations  of  Lincoln,  except  to  far- 
off  and  disinterested  readers  of  the  speeches,  were 
fruitless.  Once  insisting  upon  the  great  principle  of 
equality,  no  qualifications  that  he  could  make  before 
an  audience  weighed  in  the  balance  against  the  inso- 
lent substitute  for  argument,  "  Will  you  marry  a  nig- 
ger ? "  "  Will  you  invite  'em  to  dinner  ? "  Stung 
by  the  persistent  unfairness,  Lincoln  replied,  "  Any- 
thing that  argues  me  into  his  (Douglas's)  idea  of  per- 
fect social  and  political  equality  with  the  negro  is  but 
a  specious  and  fantastic  arrangement  of  words  by 
which  a  man  can  prove  a  horse-chestnut  to  be  a 
chestnut  horse." 

This  sentence  summarizes  the  interminable  at- 
tempts that  have  been  made  to  prove  that  the  dream 
of  the  democracy  is  mere  fatuity.  The  explanation 
of  this  is  easier,  because  few  subjects,  if  interpreted 
with  any  literalness,  are  so  open  to  attack  and  to 
raillery.  If  there  is  one  fact  about  which  human  ex- 
perience can  have  an  absolute  opinion,  it  is  the  fact 
of  diversity  and  inequality  of  gifts.  Nor  is  there  a 
sign  that  this  diversity  and  inequality  are  being  ex- 
tinguished. There  are  signs  that  they  tend  uniformly 
to  deepen  with  each  new  stage  of  progress.  Certain  it 
is  that  nature  loves  variety  no  less  than  unity,  and 
greets  each  new  difference  in  her  unfolding  life  with 
delight  and  approval. 

It  is  a  measure   of   our   culture   to    shrink   from 


226  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

monotony  and  rejoice  in  variation.  I  read  a  vapid 
imitation  of  Bellamy,  in  which  none  were  to  be 
physically  more  beautiful  than  others.  The  very 
sense  and  source  of  beauty  would  thus  expire.  A 
world  in  which  at  a  given  moment  none  are  better, 
braver,  more  gracious,  more  eloquent  or  more  master- 
ful than  others,  presents  a  sorry  spectacle  to  the 
imagination.  It  is  open  to  doubt,  but  I  fancy  that  a 
society  which  insisted  upon  apportioning  exact  prop- 
erty equivalents  would  affront  the  common  sense  of 
any  well-developed  race.  A  race  that  has  become 
both  strong  and  kind,  would  be  eager  that  property 
should  go  according  to  needs  and  to  gifts.  As  these 
varied,  the  use  of  property  would  vary. 

If,  then,  our  discussion  is  to  begin  with  these  admis- 
sions of  inevitable  inequality,  what  remains  for  argu- 
ment? The  whole  practical  question  is,  I  believe, 
untouched  by  any  of  these  concessions.  Lincoln's 
phrase,  "specious  and  fantastic  arrangement  of 
words,"  as  applied  to  equality,  was  never  more  in 
fashion  than  now.  Many  an  uncompromising  de- 
fender of  society,  as  now  organized,  is  quick  to  make 
merry  over  every  suggestion  of  equality. 

There  is  some  excuse  for  this,  if  the  word  be  taken 
narrowly,  or  if  many  of  the  past  interpretations  of 
equality  be  accepted.  If,  on  the  contrary,  we  are 
willing  to  take  the  word  at  its  best,  take  it  as  it  is 
now  used  even  by  the  broader-minded  of  the  socialist 
writers,  the  notion  of  equality  presents  no  paralyzing 
difficulty  whatever.  The  better  to  establish  this  fact, 
let  us  look  first  at  the  narrower  meaning  and  at  the 
illusions  with  which  the  word  has  been  associated. 

So  many  graphic  efforts  have  been  made  in  this 


THE   MASTER   PASSION  OF   DEMOCRACY  227 

country  to  force  an  artificial  uniformity,  that  the 
attention  has  been  diverted  from  the  essential  spirit 
of  equal  privilege.  Perhaps  the  history  of  no  peo- 
ple offers  so  great  a  variety  of  picturesque  attempts 
to  realize  social  equality  as  the  United  States  during 
the  nineteenth  century.  The  century  opens  with  the 
election  of  a  chief  magistrate  consecrated  to  this  end. 
No  sooner  was  Jefferson  in  office  than  he  began  to 
practise  la  vie  /galitaire,  the  ideals  of  which  so  fasci- 
nated him  in  France.  In  1801,  he  proclaimed  his 
purpose  to  efface,  at  his  receptions  and  at  his  table, 
every  form  of  class  distinction.  All  rules  of  prece- 
dence, hitherto  customary,  were  to  be  set  aside. 
This  was  the  famous  pele-mele  that  so  enraged  the 
British  minister.  The  general  dismay  was  at  its 
height  in  1804,  when  Jefferson  wrote  privately  to 
Monroe,  "We  have  told  him  (the  English  minister) 
that  the  principle  of  society  as  well  as  of  govern- 
ment with  us  is  the  equality  of  the  individuals  com- 
posing it ;  that  no  man  here  would  come  to  a  dinner 
where  he  was  to  be  marked  with  inferiority  to  any 
other ;  that  we  might  as  well  attempt  to  force  our 
principle  of  equality  at  St.  James's  as  he  his  princi- 
ple of  precedence  here."  The  British  minister  wrote 
home  that  the  foreign  representatives  and  their  wives 
"are  now  placed  here  in  a  situation  so  degrading  to 
the  countries  they  represent,  and  so  personally  dis- 
agreeable to  themselves,  as  to  become  almost  intoler- 
able." The  French  minister  wrote  to  Talleyrand 
that  "all  Washington  was  turned  upside  down."  It 
is  not  probable  that  an  abler  or  a  more  sincere  and 
honest  trial  of  "the  equal  life"  among  the  functions 
at  the  Capitol,  could  ever  be  made  than  that  which 


228  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

was  made  by  Jefferson  under  his  "Canons  of  Eti- 
quette," that  had  the  formal  approval  of  his  Cabinet. 

The  experiment,  however,  left  as  little  trace  as  any 
of  the  hundred  Utopias  that  have  been  tried  in  our 
country.  The  failure  came,  not  because  foreign  am- 
bassadors treated  it  with  ridicule  and  disdain,  but  be- 
cause our  own  people  did  not  continue  to  like  it,  more 
than  the  foreigners  liked  it.  To  see  why  any  one  of 
the  Utopias  miscarries,  is  to  see  why  Jefferson's  hope 
came  to  nought.  It  matters  little  which  experiment 
we  select.  One  of  the  ablest  and  most  practical 
business  men  in  England,  Robert  Owen,  started  one 
in  Indiana  in  1826.  The  thirty  thousand  acres  of 
land,  the  mills  and  houses,  cost  him  $150,000  —  a 
large  fortune  for  those  days.  It  excited  much  in- 
terest, and  the  Hall  of  Representatives  in  Wash- 
ington was  opened  to  him  and  crowded  with 
distinguished  hearers  two  long  evenings,  to  hear  the 
story  of  the  "changed  circumstances  that  should 
make  for  equality."  Several  men  of  note  were 
among  the  members  of  this  colony  in  Indiana :  Vigo, 
the  painter;  Maclure,  a  rich  geologist  of  note, 
attracted  by  the  Pestalozzian  system  of  education ; 
and  a  well-known  naturalist,  Alexander  le  Seur.  In 
1824,  all  hopes  were  high. 

The  first  signs  of  mutiny  come  with  the  endeavor 
to  enforce  the  details  of  the  equal  life.  If  the  mem- 
bers are  to  be  sincere  in  discarding  the  tokens  of 
artificial  superiority,  what  better  beginning  than  with 
personal  dress  ?  It  was  therefore  decreed  that  the 
dress  should  be  uniform.  The  men  should  be  clothed 
in  a  jacket  without  marked  color,  the  trousers  at- 
tached to  the  jacket  by  buttons.  It  was  early  noted 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          2  29 

that  while  many  men  submitted,  they  were  not  the 
most  desirable  members  of  the  "Community  of 
Equality."  Many  of  the  best  male  members  openly 
sulked  beneath  this  colorless  jacket.  As  for  the 
women,  the  disapproval  was  instant  and  unmistaka- 
ble. They  were  to  be  garmented  in  an  unadorned 
frock  extending  a  little  below  the  knee.  The  rest  of 
the  raiment  was  to  consist  of  pantalets.  The  sulky 
protests  of  the  men  were  very  subdued  compared  to 
the  unconcealed  displeasure  of  the  women.  There 
could  be  no  reasonable  check  on  the  expression  of 
their  vexation,  because,  in  the  final  constitution,  abso- 
lute freedom  of  speech  was  made  not  only  a  privilege 
but  a  duty.  The  women  were  quick  to  avail  them- 
selves of  this  fundamental  right.  They  not  only  flatly 
refused  to  wear  the  vestments  of  equality,  but  formed, 
forthwith,  a  sort  of  sympathetic  strike  against  any 
and  all  women  members  who  dared  to  appear  in 
them.  To  Mr.  Owen  this  behavior  seemed  unworthy, 
but  it  caused  him  no  misgivings.  He  said  it  was 
natural  that  people  brought  up  in  the  long  tradition 
of  frivolous  personal  distinctions  should  be  slow  to 
free  themselves  from  its  influence.  If  the  right  be- 
ginning were  made  with  the  young,  these  foibles  would 
pass  away  with  other  perversities  of  human  nature. 

The  splendid  optimism  of  Robert  Owen  was  a  part 
of  his  genius.  The  history  of  social  reform  has  few 
names  to  which  the  future  will  give  superior  rank. 
I  believe  that  the  practical  economic  achievements  of 
the  English  democracy  owe  more  to  him  than  to  any 
other  man.  It  is  very  plain,  however,  that  many  of 
his  special  methods  of  reaching  equality  were  humor- 
ously ill  chosen. 


230  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

In  all  that  Thomas  Jefferson  did  in  Virginia  to 
abolish  primogeniture,  the  entail  of  property,  and  to 
insure  religious  liberty,  his  contributions  to  equality 
were  great.  If  he  had  done  what  he  wished  to 
do,  establish  popular  education  and  abolish  slavery, 
no  name  in  our  history  would  have  been  so  illus- 
trious, but  the  details  of  the  pele-mele  are  of  the 
same  order  as  the  colorless  jacket  and  the  pantalets. 
If  there  is  a  single  lesson  to  be  read  from  the  long 
list  of  insolvent  Utopias,  it  is  that  the  thing  we  call 
human  nature  will  not  submit  to  have  thrust  upon  it 
the  externals  of  a  literal  equality. 

The  literary  Utopias  are  unabashed  by  these  per- 
plexities. In  Bellamy's  world,  each  person  has  an 
extremely  liberal  credit  card.  This  lordly  provision 
is  possible,  because  a  fine  imagination  has  spirited 
away  a  host  of  awkward  difficulties.  Wealth  has 
been  multiplied  by  the  author  at  least  a  dozen  times ; 
the  wealth  enjoyed  in  common,  indefinitely  increased, 
and  what  is  of  greater  importance  than  both  of  these 
items,  the  whole  population  has  somehow  become 
prudent  and  self-controlled  and  delicately  consider- 
ate of  others.  If  one  does  not  exhaust  his  credit 
card,  he  cannot  save  for  himself  what  remains.  It 
passes  to  the  common  treasury,  and  he  begins  the 
new  year  with  a  new  credit  symbol. 

Industrial  changes  that  should  give  us,  in  the  year 
2000,  ten  or  twelve  times  more  wealth  each  year 
than  we  now  have,  are  perhaps  among  the  pos- 
sibilities of  the  coming  century.  It  would  not  be 
more  startling  than  the  changes  that  have  become  the 
commonplaces  of  the  century  just  closing.  A  far 
tougher  strain  upon  our  credulity  is  the  transforma- 


THE   MASTER   PASSION   OF  DEMOCRACY          231 

tion  in  the  race  of  men  and  women.  The  unfailing 
trait  in  every  Utopia  is  this  assumed  change  in  race 
qualities.  There  is  no  difficulty  that  cannot  be 
evaded,  if  one  sets  out  with  the  right  kind  of  hu- 
manity, or  imagines  one  that  has  reached  far  higher 
development.  Certainly  the  chief  sources  of  our 
social  troubles  are  old-fashioned  ignorance  and  self- 
ishness. If  one  choose  to  conceive  a  race  that  is 
without  ignorance  and  without  selfishness,  the  new 
society  is  at  hand.  Bellamy  is  not  unaware  of  this 
fact,  and  therefore  finds  it  necessary  to  introduce  a 
religious  revival  —  a  revival  such  as  the  world  has 
never  seen  for  universality  and  thoroughness.  Other 
worldly  motives  do  not  enter  into  it.  A  sublime 
enthusiasm  for  the  good  of  all  in  this  present  world 
lifted  the  multitude  into  an  ecstasy  of  well-doing. 
The  revival  did  not  cause  the  economic  changes,  but 
was  rather  caused  by  them.  As  we  are  told,  it  "made 
a  short  story  of  the  later  stages  of  the  great  upturn- 
ing." Many  believed  that  the  industrial  revolution 
would  require  decades,  but  Dr.  Leite  says  to  Julian, 
while  they  wait  for  the  play  :  — 

"  Those  who  held  this  opinion  failed  to  take  account 
of  the  popular  enthusiasm  which  would  certainly 
take  possession  of  the  movement  and  drive  it  irre- 
sistibly forward  from  the  moment  that  the  prospect 
of  its  success  became  fairly  clear  to  the  masses." 
Giving  the  history  of  this  enthusiasm,  he  further 
adds :  "  An  impassioned  eagerness  seized  upon  the 
multitude  to  enter  into  the  delectable  land,  so  that 
they  found  every  day's,  every  hour's  delay  intoler- 
able. The  young  said,  '  Let  us  make  haste,  and  go 
into  the  promised  land  while  we  are  young,  that  we 


232  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

may  know  what  living  is.'  And  the  old  said,  '  Let 
us  go  in  ere  we  die,  that  we  may  close  our  eyes  in 
peace,  knowing  that  it  will  be  well  with  our  children 
after  us.'  The  leaders  and  pioneers  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, after  having  for  so  many  years  exhorted  and 
appealed  to  a  people  for  the  most  part  indifferent  or 
incredulous,  now  found  themselves  caught  up  and 
borne  onward  by  a  mighty  wave  of  enthusiasm  which 
it  was  impossible  for  them  to  check  and  difficult  for 
them  to  guide,  had  not  the  way  been  so  plain." 

Then  to  cap  the  climax,  as  if  the  popular  mind 
were  not  already  in  a  sufficiently  exalted  frame,  came 
the  Great  Revival,  touching  this  enthusiasm  with 
religious  emotion.  This  quotation  is  not  presented  as 
a  target  for  gibes,  but  to  show  the  magician's  skill  in 
overcoming  difficulties.  The  author  knew  that  his 
scheme  could  not  work,  even  in  the  imagination  of  the 
reader,  unless  the  inexorable  selfishness  of  man  was 
dislodged.  If  equality  were  temporarily  won,  the  old 
devil  of  self-seeking  would  destroy  it  again.  The 
revival  is  made  equal  to  the  occasion.  Even  of  the 
capitalists  who  fare  ill  in  the  book,  it  is  said : 
"  They  were  not  persons  of  a  more  depraved  disposi- 
tion than  other  people,  but  merely  like  other  classes, 
what  the  economic  system  had  made  them.  Having 
like  passions  and  sensibilities  with  other  men,  they 
were  as  incapable  of  standing  out  against  the  con- 
tagion of  the  enthusiasm  of  humanity,  the  passion  of 
pity,  and  the  compulsion  of  humane  tenderness  which 
the  Great  Revival  had  aroused,  as  any  other  class  of 
people." 

With  an  influence  so  irresistible  at  one's  disposal, 
no  millennium  need  be  postponed.  The  communist 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          233 

carries  the  division  of  property  still  further  than  the 
socialist ;  but  if  self-seeking  is  expunged,  the  extremer 
equality  is  as  easy  as  the  other.  The  philosophic 
anarchist  has  a  splendid  ideal ;  a  society  in  which  no 
prison,  police,  court,  or  law  is  necessary.  If  a  revival 
or  any  other  agency  could  make  all  people  behave 
so  well  that  no  external  constraint  was  necessary;  if 
there  were  absolute  generosity,  forbearance,  and  good 
will,  this  ideal,  too,  could  be  realized.  The  Sphinx 
riddle  is  how  to  get  such  behavior.  At  present  the 
Utopias  monopolize  it.  The  world,  as  known  to  us, 
is  moved  by  other  and  far  more  complex  motives. 

To  the  cynical,  the  Utopias  have  ever  been  the 
easy  mark  of  satire ;  and  when  they  failed,  the 
crushed  hopes  met  from  the  outside  only  general 
hilarity  and  I-told-you-so  complacency.  The  lack 
of  sympathy  with  heroic  and  unselfish  attempts  to 
realize  equality  is  itself  evidence  of  the  common  dis- 
like of  equality.  One  of  the  later  experiments,  at 
Ruskin,  Tennessee,  for  which  great  hopes  had  been 
felt,  has  met  disaster.  I  have  gathered  many  opin- 
ions from  the  press,  but  among  them  all  no  kindly 
note  of  appreciation.  Has  the  world,  at  heart,  a 
fixed,  unconscious  hatred  of  equality  ? 

The  history  of  these  hardy  enterprises  is  very 
chilling.  For  most  it  is  a  question  of  months,  of 
years  for  a  few.  A  small  fraction  is  held  in  some 
permanence  if  only  the  binding  power  of  religion  is 
there.  Religious  sects  can  get  little  comfort  from 
this,  because  it  seems  not  to  matter  much  what  kind 
of  religion  holds  them ;  that  of  the  Mormon  and  the 
Shaker  appear  to  be  among  the  best  for  the  purpose. 
If  these  communities  are  destitute  of  sturdy  faith 


234  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

or  superstition,  if  you  will,  that  subdues  them  into 
habits  of  obedience,  they  fall  to  pieces.  They  start 
radiant  with  high  and  noble  purpose.  In  the  begin- 
ning no  sacrifice  is  wanting  to  realize  the  equal  life. 
But  a  few  moons  come  and  go,  and  then  a  subtle 
poison  begins  its  work. 

Here  again  the  explanation  is  seen  in  our  most 
common  observation  of  ourselves  and  of  the  men  and 
women  about  us.  A  few  years  ago  the  American 
papers  were  very  jocular  at  the  expense  of  a  rich 
American  in  London,  because  of  his  published  claims 
to  a  distinguished  family  lineage.  Yet  that  is  what 
half  one's  acquaintances  are  everywhere  doing  to  the 
extent  of  their  ingenuity.  Heraldry  now  is  a  charmed 
word  for  multitudes  of  very  humble  people.  Libra- 
rians are  suddenly  plagued  by  the  importunity  for 
genealogical  evidence  of  distinguished  ancestry. 
Daughters  of  this  and  daughters  of  that ;  clubs, 
coteries,  everywhere  springing  into  life,  bound  to 
discover  proof  that  they  are  not  quite  like  other 
people.  I  saw  a  Colonial  Dame  flushed  with  de- 
light because  on  a  great  occasion  in  another  city 
her  badge  had  given  her  showy  precedence  over  cer- 
tain Daughters  of  the  Revolution,  who  at  home  never 
failed  to  let  her  feel  her  social  inferiority.  She  said, 
"  In  all  my  life,  no  minute  ever  gave  me  a  joy  like 
that."  The  women  need  have  no  shame,  they  can- 
not outdo  the  men  in  this  pursuit.  Scarcely  a  town 
that  is  not  gay  with  embellished  orders  stamped  with 
every  display  of  royal  and  knightly  nomenclature. 
Read  the  list  of  officers  from  the  Sublime  Grand 
Master  down,  and  ask  what  aristocracy  in  history  ever 
went  farther  in  its  hunt  for  feathers.  Two  or  three 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          235 

years  ago  there  was  a  gathering  of  three  or  four 
orders  in  Boston.  From  a  single  copy  of  the  Herald 
I  take  the  following  modest  titles,  —  Grand  Dictator, 
Grand  Chancellor,  Supreme  President,  Grand  Vice 
Dictator,  Supreme  Warden.1  This  outbreak  is  a  droll 
commentary  upon  a  society  that  has  found  so  much 
to  ridicule  in  the  "  haughty  infirmities  "  of  the  old 
world.  It  has  sprung,  however,  straight  from  human 
nature.  We  have  won  wealth  and  some  leisure  that 
have  brought  us  into  contact  with  foreign  sources  of 
distinction  that  we  lack.  No  people  ever  displayed 
the  passion  for  inequality  more  greedily  than  we. 
One  builds  a  yacht,  and  if  he  can  dine  an  English 
prince  at  the  Cowes  races,  or  entice  the  German  Em- 
peror on  board  at  Kiel,  this  single  breath  of  royal 
atmosphere  at  once  endows  the  enterprising  host  with 
the  rarest  social  privileges  at  home.  Every  circle 
breaks  at  the  touch  of  the  king's  hand. 

This  craving  to  index  oneself  off  from  others,  by 
any  mark  that  can  be  hit  upon,  is  not  very  vicious, 
perhaps  not  always  bad,  but  it  is  the  essence  of 
inequality  and  shows  how  rooted  an  instinct  it  is 
within  us.  I  asked  the  head  of  a  fashionable  city 
school  about  the  parents  that  brought  their  daughters 
to  her.  "  It  is,"  she  said,  "  so  unusual  as  to  surprise 
me  when  a  parent  shows  any  other  real  anxiety  than 
to  secure  for  her  child  certain  social  connections. 
Education  has  no  meaning  except  as  it  furthers  this 
end."  If  this  is  snobbish,  what  is  it  for  working 
girls'  clubs  to  exclude  household  domestics  ?  I  have 
known  Boston  shop-girls  at  their  dances  to  put  up 
a  placard  marked,  "  No  servants  admitted."  No 

1  Sunday  Herald,  October  7,  1900. 


236  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

social  group   that  can  be  named  is  free  from  this 
itching. 

It  is  only  when  facts  like  these  are  faced  without 
flinching  or  evasion,  that  the  failure  of  most  Utopian 
schemes  is 'seen  to  be  inevitable  until  far  more  radi- 
cal work  has  been  done  upon  race  habits.  It  has 
often  been  said  that  these  failures  have  been  caused 
by  unwillingness  to  work.  The  records  give  the  lie 
to  this  explanation  in  scores  of  cases.  The  shirking 
of  tasks  is  but  a  partial  and  secondary  difficulty. 
Deeper  than  this,  and  far  more  uniform  and  perma- 
nent, is  the  depressing  fact  that  the  members  do  not 
continue  to  love  each  other.  On  the  first  high  tide 
of  generous  ardor,  they  rejoice  in  each  other's  com- 
pany at  all  hours.  They  are  eager  to  sit  at  a  com- 
mon table,  and  to  share  the  products  of  a  common 
toil,  but  this  love-feast  rarely  continues.  The  most 
saintly  among  them  are  often  the  least  manageable 
of  all.  A  single  passage  from  a  private  letter  of  one 
who  had  seen  much  of  this  community  life  throws 
an  almost  pitiless  light  on  the  entire  history  :  "  We 
all  liked  each  other  at  first,  as  brothers  and  sisters 
should.  But  a  very  devil  of  ill  will  and  suspicion 
began  to  show  itself  in  the  second  month  between 
Brother  H.  and  Brother  F.  It  began  in  a  way  so 
contemptible  that  I  am  ashamed  to  tell  it.  Brother 
H.  had  an  ailing  stomach  and  could  not  eat  a  certain 
sweet  pudding  served  once  a  week.  Brother  F.'s 
great  fondness  for  this  dish  so  worked  upon  the  feel- 
ings of  Brother  H.  that  he  could  not  refrain  from 
un-Christian  remarks  to  those  about  him."  This  nar- 
rative continues  in  the  same  rare  vein,  but  it  needs 
no  further  quoting.  Though  only  a  sweet  pudding,  it 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          237 

resulted  in  the  sourest  ferment  for  several  others  to 
whom  it  gave  opportunity  to  vent  their  own  ill  humors. 
The  incident  is  less  frivolous  than  it  appears,  for  it 
was  merely  an  occasion  to  express  feelings  that  in 
default  of  pudding  would  have  seized  upon  the  soup  or 
the  cut  of  the  beard.  Sometimes  it  is  the  manner  of 
eating,  sometimes  it  is  too  much  or  too  loud  talking, 
sometimes  too  little.  Silence  irritates  as  well  as 
garrulity.  Gossip,  jokes  ill-timed,  low  vitality  in  one, 
and  buoyant  health  in  another,  humor  here  and  lack 
of  it  there,  romantic  fervor  in  this  member,  and  in 
another  only  gray  matter  of  fact. 

The  result  is  the  more  easily  understood  because  the 
personnel  of  these  communities  is  naturally  composed 
of  those  who  had  already  become  extremely  critical 
of  the  old  society  which  they  found  so  faulty.  They 
bring  to  the  new  society  the  same  qualities  that  could 
not  tolerate  former  associations.  In  the  letter 
quoted,  it  is  said,  "  We  expected  to  attract  queer  people, 
but  that  there  were  so  many  kinds  of  queerness  and 
that  they  could  be  so  unreasonable,  we  had  to  learn 
by  most  disheartening  experience." 

These  are  but  the  oldest  platitudes  of  race  experi- 
ence. The  members  of  these  Utopias  were  thrown 
too  closely  and  too  constantly  together.  If  people 
like  each  other,  they  also  dislike  each  other ;  if  they 
are  held  together  by  attractions,  they  are  also  driven 
apart  by  repulsions,  and  space  must  be  given  for  the 
selective  process  of  both  impulses  —  for  antipathies 
as  well  as  for  affections.  Unless  the  Buddhist  and 
Catholic  monasteries  are  thought  to  be  satisfactory 
ideals  of  the  equal  life,  there  is  no  sign  in  the  history 
of  more  than  four  hundred  experiments,  that  a  vigor- 


238  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

ous  humanity  will  long  resign  itself  to  any  separate 
colony  scheme  that  the  wit  of  the  reformer  has  thus 
far  devised.  People  are  driven  together  under  condi- 
tions so  narrow,  with  so  much  sameness,  that  the 
limits  become  unbearable  after  the  first  enthusiasm 
subsides.  The  test  which  every  colony  must  meet, 
that  sets  itself  apart  from  the  great  world,  is  to  make 
the  conditions  of  the  community  life  so  rich  in  variety, 
that  the  various  temperaments  can  find  room  for 
activity.  Not  to  do  this,  is  soon  to  let  loose  every 
imp  of  petty  jealousy  and  bickering  that  possesses  the 
human  creature.  The  commonest  lessons  from  every 
almshouse  and  old  ladies'  home  should  have  taught 
us  this.  That  which  now  keeps  these  defects  some- 
what in  abeyance  is  that  competitive  society,  bad  as 
it  is,  gives  man  leeway  for  his  energy.  The  stronger 
the  personality,  the  more  room  and  variety  is  needed 
for  self-expression.  No  one  can  look  upon  the  Shakers 
without  feeling  that  their  community  has  merely 
selected  from  the  outside  millions  a  certain  type  of 
man  and  woman,  kindly  and  docile,  but  for  the  most 
part  destitute  of  virility.  Men  and  women  rich  in 
strong  personal  character  cannot  be  so  cabined. 

I  have  heard  a  kindly  and  intelligent  sea  captain, 
half  his  life  spent  in  long  voyages,  say  that  the 
severest  test  to  morals  that  he  ever  faced  was  with 
his  own  crew  and  passengers  after  two  months 
at  sea.  "  We  became  touchy,  sour,  and  disagreeable 
for  the  most  ridiculous  reasons.  I  have  been  surly 
the  entire  day,  because  the  mate  said  good  morning, 
and  surly  another  day,  because  he  did  not.  On  a 
four  months'  voyage,  I  have  seen  passengers  act  for 
days  as  if  they  loathed  each  other.  When  we  had 


THE   MASTER   PASSION   OF  DEMOCRACY  239 

escaped   from  the  ship,  and  had  been  two  days  on 
land,  we  treated  each  other  like  human  beings." 

The  saintly  F.  D.  Maurice,  riding  in  a  London 
omnibus,  over  the  jolting  pavement,  imagines  the 
effect  of  smooth  pavements  (just  being  introduced) 
upon  the  friendly  good-nature  of  the  passengers. 
When  the  rattling  ceases,  Maurice  fancies  that  stran- 
gers will  catch  eagerly  at  the  opportunity  of  holding' 
sweet  converse  with  each  other.  The  pavement  has 
come,  and  one  may  ride  a  hundred  miles  upon  it 
without  observing  the  slightest  general  tendency  to 
embrace  the  chance  of  neighborly  intercourse. 

When  the  passengers  rush  to  fill  our  railway  trains, 
do  they  try  to  get  together  ?  Unless  with  a  friend 
or  with  one  of  their  family,  they  apparently  desire 
nothing  so  much  as  to  keep  apart  in  a  separate  seat, 
or  in  two  seats  if  they  can  monopolize  them.  There  is 
not  the  least  eagerness  to  entice  strangers  to  occupy 
the  place  beside  them.  The  apart-instinct  is  as 
powerful  as  the  together-instinct,  and  it  does  not 
become  less  so  as  society  develops.  The  proprietor 
of  one  of  the  older  Boston  hotels  told  me  that  when 
he  worked  in  a  hotel  for  his  father,  a  generation  ago, 
men  who  had  never  seen  each  other  made  no  objec- 
tion to  taking  the  same  bed,  or  sleeping  three  beds  in 
a  room.  "  Now,"  he  added,  "  half  my  customers 
would  leave  for  another  hotel,  rather  than  submit 
to  have  their  bed  in  the  same  room  with  another. 
Everybody  wants  to  keep  as  far  away  from  others  as 
he  can  get."  This  does  not  mean  that  there  is  less 
good  will  among  men  than  in  more  promiscuous 
times.  The  gay  knights  and  ladies  of  the  Rhine 
castles  who  ate  with  their  fingers  out  of  the  same  dish 


240  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

and  knew  no  napkins,  were  not  more  unselfish  than 
the  modern,  who  insists  upon  a  separate  plate.  Sep- 
arateness  and  apartness  increase  with  every  step  in 
the  social  growth.  Upon  one  side  common  functions, 
common  wealth,  common  privileges,  are  enlarged. 
Parks,  libraries,  museums,  vast  educational  facilities, 
are  everywhere  increasing  at  the  same  time  that  purely 
individual  functions  increase.  The  together-instincts 
do  not  develop  more  rapidly  than  the  apart-instincts. 
No  social  scheme  that  fails  to  reckon  with  the  ever 
widening  variety  of  race  energies  has  a  moment's 
chance  of  success.  The  literary  Utopias  often  avoid 
these  stubborn  realities  by  first  destroying  society  in 
order  to  have  the  ground  cleared  for  their  own  build- 
ing, or  they  begin  on  an  island  or  in  some  realm  of 
nowhere,  unplagued  by  complicated  traditions. 

Bellamy  is  unusual  in  this,  that  he  pluckily  takes 
up  society  as  it  is.  Syndicates,  trusts,  department 
stores,  furnish  him  with  his  best  material.  Develop 
them  far  enough  and  universally  enough  and  petty 
individual  enterprises  will  be  wiped  out,  or  gathered 
into  these  colossal  undertakings  that  only  the  state  can 
manage.  But  Bellamy's  own  material  is  dangerous 
in  his  hands,  for  the  reason  that  it  hardens  in  spite 
of  him  into  a  huge  mechanism  that  fills  many  of  his 
own  persuasion  with  repugnance.  The  most  pictu- 
resque incident,  as  well  as  one  of  the  most  significant, 
in  modern  socialistic  thought,  occurs  for  our  instruc- 
tion almost  as  soon  as  Bellamy's  dream  was  fairly 
before  the  world.  It  came  from  a  brother  socialist, 
but  one  of  far  richer  and  more  varied  power  than 
Bellamy  possessed,  the  English  poet  and  artist,  Will- 
iam Morris.  He,  too,  has  the  divine  rage  against  the 


THE   MASTER   PASSION   OF  DEMOCRACY          24! 

competitive  system.  He,  too,  will  destroy  it,  root  and 
branch,  but  he  is  first  of  all  poet  and  artist  craftsman, 
vitalizing  every  hour  with  more  intense  and  diverse 
life  energy  than  any  one  of  the  famed  group  of  which 
he  was  a  part.  Morris  catches  greedily  at  "  Looking 
Backward,"  reads  and  rereads  it,  but  is  choked  in  its 
atmosphere.  If  one  who  called  Bellamy  comrade, 
who  called  himself  a  socialist,  feels  such  acute  aver- 
sion, as  if  cramped  and  stifled  when  he  has  to  inhabit 
Bellamy's  social  fabric  merely  in  imagination,  what 
would  happen  to  a  nation  with  pulsing  activity  an 
hundred-fold  more  multiform  than  in  any  single 
individual,  however  gifted  ? 1 

It  would  be  without  excuse  to  linger  at  such  length 
over  the  Utopias  if  they  did  not  present  both  a  theory 
and  a  practice  of  equality.  In  their  literary  form,  as 
in  their  varied  experimenting,  they  furnish  inestimable 
material  for  judgment.  They  show  us  what  men  and 
women  think  about  a  certain  kind  of  equality  before 
they  try  it,  and  what  they  think  after  the  trial  is  made. 
These  experiments  have  gone  on  through  many 
centuries  and  among  many  nationalities.  They  have 
taken  widely  different  forms.  At  least  twenty  are 
struggling  at  the  present  time  with  the  same  hopes 
and  the  same  embarrassments.  I  have  seen  the 
records  of  fourteen  attempts  made  in  Australian 
colonies.  The  three  or  four  that  now  seem  least 
likely  to  fail  are  so  greatly  modified  by  securing 
private  property  rights  that  they  appear  to  set  slight 
value  on  equality  in  its  Utopian  sense.  The  literal 
interpretation  of  equality  has  no  logical  completeness 
except  in  communism.  Communism  captivates  at 

1  Both  Bebel  and  Kautsky  had  the  same  feeling  as  Morris. 
R 


242  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

the  same  time  the  saint  and  the  loafer.  It  offers  to 
the  imagination  what  the  heroic  are  glad  to  give,  and 
to  the  dead-beat  what  he  is  greedy  to  take. 

As  the  socialist  dialectic  will  always  embarrass  the 
advocate  of  the  single  tax,  so  the  logic  of  the  com- 
munist will  harass  the  socialist,  because  he  leaves 
certain  forms  of  property  still  in  private  possession. 
To  the  communist,  one  form  is  as  nefarious  as  an- 
other. I  knew  an  apostle  of  unflinching  equality,  a 
French  tgalitaire,  who  was  dedicated  absolutely  to  his 
principles.  The  coat  on  his  back,  his  writing-desk 
and  books,  the  wife  with  whom  he  lived,  belonged,  he 
claimed,  as  strictly  to  another  as  to  himself.  "  The 
principle,"  he  added,  "  loses  its  greatness  and  its  power 
over  men  if  it  is  not  harmonious  and  complete."  The 
socialists,  more  than  all  others,  roused  his  wrath, 
"because  they  pick  and  choose,"  he  said,  "like  the 
stupid  bourgeois,  this  or  that  fragment  of  equality, 
according  to  their  taste." 

In  the  extraordinary  success  of  the  great  foundry 
(familisttre)  at  Guise,  in  North  France,  Godin  carried 
equality  to  the  farthest  limits  consistent  with  the 
management  of  a  great  and  paying  business.  His 
youth  was  fired  with  communistic  ideals.  Though 
rich,  he  lived  in  the  same  building  with  his  workmen ; 
but  in  their  common  theatre  his  family  seat  was  some- 
what apart  and  better  than  the  others.  In  showing  me 
this  a  workman  said,  "  Godin  was  true  to  the  great  prin- 
ciple up  to  a  certain  point,  but  we  never  liked  it  that 
he  did  not  watch  the  play  from  the  same  seat  as  the 
rest  of  us."  This  workman  was  in  the  theoretic  stage. 
Godin  was  sorely  plagued  by  the  importunity  of  this 
type  of  workman,  as  those  who  have  to  apply  theory 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          243 

will  always  be  worried  by  the  unhampered  critic. 
This  is  the  chastening  ordeal  which  socialism  must 
undergo  in  the  coming  century,  as  it  tries  to  bring  us 
nearer  the  "  reign  of  equal  rights." 

II 

Realities 

It  was  my  endeavor  in  the  last  chapter  to  state 
fully  and  fairly  the  ineffaceable  limits  which  experi- 
ence has  already  drawn  about  the  pettier  conceptions 
of  equality.  The  origin  of  many  of  the  most  star- 
tling inequalities  is  biological.  To  get  born  with  cer- 
tain qualities  is  to  have  many  chances  to  one  against 
the  man  who  came  into  life  without  them.  We  all 
see  that  the  sources  of  superiority  are  in  the  gifts  that 
cannot  be  made  equal.  The  mysteries  of  tempera- 
ment, buoyancy,  vivid  imagination,  prudence,  charms 
of  personality,  tact,  inflexible  purpose,  steadiness  of 
self-control,  and  even  physical  gifts,  like  good  diges- 
tion and  ability  to  sleep,  are  qualities  that  lead  men 
beyond  the  average  of  their  fellows.  To  put  the  least 
check  upon  these  distinctions  (or  inequalities)  would 
bring  a  common  and  a  grievous  loss. 

We  have  thus  far  neither  the  wisdom  nor  the  moral 
courage  to  raise  the  questions  on  which  these  con- 
genital superiorities  depend.  For  a  very  indefinite 
future  these  deep  sources  of  inequality  will  remain 
practically  beyond  our  influence.  These  are  difficul- 
ties, however,  that  in  no  way  conflict  with  a  larger  and 
truer  interpretation  of  equality.  Because  absurd 
claims  to  literal  equality  have  been  made,  we  need 
not  spoil  the  discussion  by  continuing  to  repeat  them. 


244  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Helvetius  is  still  quoted  as  maintaining  that  one  man's 
gifts  (all  privileges  removed)  are  equal  to  another's. 
This  is  now  known  to  be  so  wide  of  the  truth  that  it 
is  a  poor  shift  for  an  opponent  of  equality  to  make 
much  of  such  exaggerations,  and  thus  divert  attention 
from  claims  that  may  be  rational. 

The  abler  socialist  writers  —  the  Webbs,  Vander- 
welde,  Kautsky,  Malon  —  know  the  limitations  of 
equality  indicated  in  the  last  chapter  quite  as  well  as 
smart  casuists  like  Mr.  Mallock.  They  do  not  now 
ask  for  fantastic  identities  of  gift  or  possession. 
They  ask  for  a  social  and  economic  reconstruction 
that  shall  give  new  freedom  for  race  development. 

Our  real  problem,  therefore,  is  to  know  how  far 
opportunity  to  develop  every  gift  is  open  to  all ;  how 
far  do  artificial  privileges  restrict  these  opportuni- 
ties to  the  few;  how  far  does  an  imperfect  social 
and  industrial  system  handicap  a  portion  of  the 
people;  above  all,  how  does  an  unregulated  com- 
petition select,  stimulate,  and  strengthen  individual 
qualities  and  social  ideals  that  thwart  a  genuine 
equality  ? 

When  Mr.  Webb  says,  "  We  want  to  bring  about 
the  condition  in  which  every  member  of  society  shall 
have  a  fair  chance  to  use  and  to  develop  the  gifts 
with  which  he  happens  to  be  born,"  he  is  not  putting 
in  claim  to  an  absurdity.  When  he  asks  for  a  democ- 
racy so  broadly  educated  that  it  appreciates  compe- 
tence and  its  relation  to  the  infinitely  varied  tasks  of 
society,  he  only  asks  for  what  that  very  prince  of 
democrats,  Jefferson,  called  the  "natural  aristocracy." 
In  writing  to  Adams  (October  28,  1813),  he  says, 
"  May  we  not  even  say  that  that  form  of  government 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          245 

is  best  which  provides  the  most  effectually  for  a 
pure  selection  of  these  aristoi  into  the  offices  of 
government  ? " 

If  the  purpose  is  to  try  merely  to  see  what  heart 
truth  there  is  in  this  dream,  we  shall  admit  that  all 
external  signs  of  equality,  like  dress,  apartments, 
working  hours,  are  not  of  primary,  not  even  of  sec- 
ondary, importance.  Indeed,  as  the  discussion  has 
developed,  less  and  less  stress  is  laid  upon  them,  and 
that  which  has  taken  their  place  is  indicated  by  vague 
commonplace  phrases  such  as  "  equality  of  oppor- 
tunity." It  has  no  ultimate  purpose  that  all  receive 
the  same  material  gifts.  These,  equal  or  unequal, 
exist  for  an  end  beyond  themselves ;  that  end  is  the 
largest,  freest,  and  richest  life  of  which  the  individual 
is  capable.  But  who  would  claim  that  equal  material 
gifts  are  necessary  to  this  ideal  ?  If  the  goal  is  a 
society  in  which  all  can  live  out  openly  and  health- 
fully every  faculty  they  possess,  then  "  equality  of 
chance "  is  as  good  a  phrase  as  any  to  express 
the  conditions  that  would  make  such  life  possi- 
ble. Both  of  these  phrases  have  become  wearisome. 
Yet  it  seems  impossible  to  fix  upon  better  ones,  if 
the  purpose  is  to  show  what  the  ideal  of  equality 
must  be. 

For  a  great  multitude  in  our  midst,  equality  of 
chance  is  choked  by  all  manner  of  obstacles.  Here 
is  the  test  to  our  honesty  in  the  discussion.  On  the 
one  side  it  is  maintained  that  the  average  man  always 
has  his  equal  chance ;  upon  the  other,  this  is  madly 
denied.  To  get  at  such  truth  as  there  is  between 
these  extremes  of  opinion  is  to  see  all  that  the  prob- 
lem can  give. 


246  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Let  us  state  again  what  is  deepest  in  this  unabating 
purpose  of  the  demos.  It  is  not  for  absolute  or  exter- 
nal equalities.  It  is  not  for  any  equality  that  will 
submit  to  nice  measurement.  It  is  for  far  more 
equality  than  exists.  It  is  for  as  much  equality  as 
each  is  capable  of  seizing  and  using  to  his  own  and 
others'  good.  All  will  admit  that  justice  halts  until 
men  and  women  in  general  do  have  essential  equality 
in  using  their  powers. 

The  Utopian  stage  has  made  it  plain  that  external 
uniformities  in  every  kind  and  degree  are  discredited. 
These  are  but  the  poor  letter  of  social  justice.  Its 
spirit  will  not  be  without  external  tokens,  but  these 
will  be  lightly  regarded.  The  spirit  of  equality 
will  appeal  to  another  order  of  evidence.  It  will 
claim  as  the  imperishable  right  of  every  child 
born  among  us  to  have,  as  far  as  possible,  the  full 
and  free  occasions  to  live  its  best  life.  A  society 
which  should  give  this  chance  to  all,  would  make 
the  nearest  approach  to  justice.  In  the  light  of  this 
conception,  we  should  straightway  test  our  evils  and 
our  remedies.  In  its  light  we  should  ask  what 
is  now  being  done  to  bring  these  fairer  results  a 
little  nearer.  In  its  light  we  should  seek  to  know 
what  class  now  has  this  opportunity  to  make  the 
most  of  life,  and  through  what  agencies  so  great 
a  good  has  been  attained.  In  its  light  we  should 
inquire  what  class  is  hindered  and  why  it  is  hin- 
dered from  putting  life  to  its  best  uses.  Unerringly 
one  can  point  to  large  sections  of  the  toiling  world 
whose  first  steps  toward  an  ampler  life  are  hopelessly 
barred. 

Let  us  test  this  by  the  very  simplest  illustrations, 


THE   MASTER   PASSION   OF  DEMOCRACY          247 

which  show  us  a  very  fountain-head  of  quite  unneces- 
sary inequalities. 

It  is  not  yet  twenty  years  since  a  careful  investi- 
gation in  Berlin  showed  that  more  than  seventy  thou- 
sand of  her  population  were  living  in  single  rooms.  It 
was  found  that  the  death-rate  for  this  group  rose  to 
the  appalling  figure  of  163.5  per  thousand  in  the 
year.  On  the  other  hand,  when  families  had  three 
or  four  rooms,  the  death-rate  fell  below  20  in  the 
thousand.  This  would  excite  only  incredulity  if  we 
had  not  the  same  history  in  English  and  Scotch  cities 
less  than  a  generation  ago.  But  the  sociological 
significance  of  this  ghastly  difference  is  not  in  the 
mere  fact  of  such  a  death  record  ;  it  is  as  nothing 
compared  with  what  that  mortality  implies.  Colonel 
Waring  believed  that  every  one  of  these  abnormal 
deaths  stood  for  more  than  ten  times  as  many  serious 
and  corrupting  illnesses.  A  death-rate  so  unnatural 
implies  degeneracy  in  the  entire  group.  A  mortality 
rate  of  18  per  thousand  may  mean  a  healthy  com- 
munity, but  a  community  devastated  to  the  extent 
of  163.5  Per  thousand  is  not  only  itself  diseased,  but 
a  source  of  general  social  disorder,  intemperance, 
crime,  prostitution,  and  special  forms  of  lawlessness.1 

Another  illustration  that  finds  its  counterpart  in 
every  community  shows  how  the  first  essentials  of 

1  Professor  Marshall  says,*  "The  extent  of  the  infant  mortality  that 
arises  from  preventable  causes  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that 
while  the  annual  death-rate  of  children  under  five  years  of  age  is  only 
about  two  per  cent  in  the  families  of  peers,  and  is  less  than  three  per 
cent  for  the  whole  of  the  upper  classes,  it  is  between  six  and  seven  per 
cent  for  the  whole  of  England,  f 

*  "  Principles  of  Economics,"  first  edition,  p.  257. 

t  The  terrible  effects  upon  the  family  when  crowded  into  small  space  may  be 
seen  in  the  first  chapter  of  Graham  Wallace's  "  Life  of  Francis  Place." 


248  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

equality  are  snatched  from  the  weak,  under  our  very 
eyes.  It  was  noted  at  the  Cambridge  Associated 
Charities  that  a  succession  of  destitute  "  cases  "  were 
traceable  to  a  crushing  indebtedness,  under  which  the 
victim  was  staggering.  An  investigation  begun  in 
January,  1896,  showed  that  in  a  few  months  over 
seven  hundred  loans  had  been  placed  among  the  poor, 
at  rates  of  interest  varying  from  50  per  cent  to  120 
per  cent.  The  existing  law  was  easily  evaded  by 
frequent  transfers  of  the  mortgage,  the  victim  pay- 
ing from  $3  to  $5  for  every  transfer.  Of  over  one 
hundred  cases  carefully  traced,  a  few  examples  will 
lay  bare  the  enormity  of  the  wrong  :  (i)  "Twenty 
dollars  were  borrowed,  from  which  $5  were  at 
once  deducted  for  '  expenses ' ;  interest  charged 
$1.50  a  month  (i.e.  90  per  cent  on  $20)  or  120  per 
cent  on  the  $15  actually  received.  Paid  $73.50  in 
interest,  after  which  mortgage  was  foreclosed,  and 
furniture  costing  $150  was  seized  and  sold,  the 
family  being  left  Saturday  night  with  nothing  but  a 
stove  and  rug."  (2)  "  Thirty-two  dollars  borrowed. 
Interest  $2.50  a  month.  When  the  case  was  taken 
in  hand  at  the  office,  $54.25  had  already  been  paid 
to  the  lender,  who  was  still  demanding  $18.50."  (3) 
"Thirty  dollars  borrowed.  Interest  $2  per  month. 
This  had  dragged  on  until  the  wretched  debtor  had 
paid  $106,  with  $29  more  to  pay." 

Who  can  assert  that  these  people  had  equality  of 
opportunity,  or  that  the  heavy  burden  of  their  un- 
equal struggle  was  a  decree  of  fate  ? 

These  cases  are  very  bad,  but  they  are  not  the 
most  extreme  ones.  If  Cambridge  is  exceptional,  it 
is  in  being  freer  from  cruelties  like  these  than  the 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          249 

average  large  town.  The  great  city  offers  a  spectacle 
of  helpless  entanglements  of  which  the  illustrations 
give  but  the  slightest  hint.  Do  these  snared  thou- 
sands have  equality  of  opportunity  ?  The  first  step 
toward  it  is  barred  from  them  by  their  ignorance, 
their  poverty,  and  the  habits  which  these  have  bred. 
The  instance  is  the  fitter  for  our  use,  because,  like  so 
many  sources  of  social  inequality,  it  is  for  the  most 
part  unnecessary.  It  is  among  the  most  hopeful  of 
sociological  discoveries  that  the  larger  part  of  these 
crippling  conditions  that  make  for  inequality,  is  merely 
a  social  blunder.  The  child  in  industry,  the  truck 
store,  a  large  part  of  the  system  of  fining  and  "  over- 
time," the  sweatshop,  the  tenement-house  evil,  are 
one  and  all  departures  from  the  highest  business 
standard.  An  honored  Boston  physician  said  at  a 
gathering  interested  in  day  nurseries :  "  We  used  to 
think  that  almost  any  treatment  was  good  enough  for 
the  babies  of  the  poor.  We  know  now  that  the  best 
which  science  affords  is  even  the  cheapest  for  society." 
The  vast  material  gathered  in  Germany,  under  the 
Sickness  and  Accident  Insurance,  proves  that  in  final 
cash  reckoning  it  pays  to  have  the  best  appliances 
for  the  sick  and  the  injured,  the  best  medicines,  the 
best  physicians,  and  the  best  nursing.  It  is  found  that 
no  extravagance  is  so  wasteful  as  a  skinflint  economy. 
As  a  result  of  this  splendid  information,  the  whole 
standard  of  ministering  to  misfortune  among  the  poor 
is  being  raised  throughout  the  entire  empire.  The 
head  of  a  great  business  in  Elgin,  Illinois,  told  me,  "  I 
have  learned  that  almost  all  over-time  work  is  bad 
management;  all  work  beyond  nine  hours  —  before 
long  we  shall  say  eight  —  is  a  mistaken  policy." 


250  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

Among  these  evils  from  which  inequalities  spring, 
some  can  be  stopped  altogether,  and  all  can  be 
diminished.  The  hiring  of  money  at  seven  or  eight 
times  the  current  rates  cannot  be  totally  extinguished. 
There  is  no  way  given  to  men  of  protecting  all 
degrees  of  carelessness  and  ignorance  from  the  con- 
sequences of  their  folly.  No  more  evidence  is  want- 
ing, however,  to  show  that  loan  associations  and 
municipal  pawnshops  may  meet  these  needs  among 
the  poor,  at  less  than  a  third  of  the  average  pawn- 
shop burden,  and  with  far  greater  safety  and  con- 
sideration for  the  borrower.  The  way  has  been 
made  clear  for  an  immense  decrease  in  this  special 
source  of  unequal  opportunities. 

What  shall  be  said  of  equal  opportunity  for  boys 
who  begin  their  careers  as  described  by  the  ablest 
factory  inspector  that  Illinois  ever  had  ?  "  In  many 
factories  it  is  customary  for  the  youngest  lad  to  go 
to  the  nearest  saloon,  carrying  a  long  pole  with 
pegs  in  its  side,  and  a  tin  can  hanging  from  every 
peg.  On  the  return  trip  the  pole  lies  across  the  lad's 
shoulder,  and  the  cans  containing  beer  swing  as  he 
walks.  He  is  paid  for  his  trouble  in  sips  of  beer. 
The  '  beer  boy  '  is  a  part  of  the  equipment  in  all 
large  smithies,  and,  indeed,  wherever  work  is  done  at 
an  excessive  temperature.  The  workmen,  full-grown 
and  able-bodied,  and  engaged  at  steady  work,  take 
their  beer  as  food  or  refreshment.  But  they  have  no 
realizing  sense  of  the  effect  on  the  little  lad's  growing 
body  and  mind  of  the  sips  which  they  give  him. 

"  A  far  larger  number  of  children  form  the  habit  of 
drinking  from  exhaustion.  They  work  out  of  all  pro- 
portion to  their  strength,  endure  the  same  extremes 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          2$  I 

of  heat,  cold,  noise,  dirt,  discomfort,  and  exhaustion 
as  the  men  among  whom  they  work,  and  feel  the  need 
of  something  —  they  do  not  know  what.  The  most 
accessible  and  instantaneous  means  of  comfort  is  a 
drink,  and  the  habit  is  easily  and  quickly  formed.  Even 
where  boys  are  restrained  from  drinking  by  the  for- 
tunate habit  of  carrying  home  all  their  earnings,  a 
practice  widespread  and  beneficent,  the  exhaustion  of 
the  long  working-day,  heavy  and  indigestible  lunch, 
and  long  journey  to  and  from  work,  in  all  weathers, 
ultimately  bring  a  craving  for  stimulants.  And  when 
a  raise  in  wages  comes,  when  the  lad  is  fifteen  or  six- 
teen, it  often  happens  that  the  old  wage  is  carried 
home  and  the  difference  spent  in  drink.  The  example 
of  the  older  men  counts  for  much  in  this,  but  physical 
exhaustion  counts  for  more." 

I  have  already  referred  to  thirty  thousand  homes, 
at  least,  in  and  about  New  York  City  alone,  in  which 
the  sweated  work  of  the  clothing  trade  is  done.  The 
Tenement-house  Commission,  with  the  help  of  the 
most  competent  physicians  in  New  York,  has  passed 
judgment  on  this  type  of  home. 

Dr.  John  H.  Pryor  said  (November  16,  1900): 
"  So  far  as  I  can  learn  there  are  in  the  tenement 
houses  of  New  York  City  alone  —  not  in  Greater  New 
York,  but  in  New  York  City  alone  —  there  are  con- 
stantly 20,000  consumptives ;  that  is,  considering  all 
the  stages  of  the  disease.  Nor  does  this  show  the 
prevalence  of  the  disease  in  the  tenement  houses; 
because  it  is  found  by  post-mortem  examination  of 
those  dying  from  other  diseases  that  very  many  of 
them  have  forms  of  tuberculosis  also.  So  that  I 
think  the  statement  is  perfectly  safe  that  a  majority 


252  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

of  the  tenement-house  dwellers  in  New  York  City 
have  tuberculosis  in  some  form.  It  is  a  disease  quite 
distinctive  of  tenement-house  life  at  the  present  time." 

This  is  the  situation  which  the  consumer  of  these 
goods  has  to  face.  The  Consumers'  League  long 
hesitated  to  lay  great  stress  upon  these  aspects  of 
filth  and  disease,  because  of  their  alarmist  and  sen- 
sational nature.  The  sober  and  authoritative  testi- 
mony, before  such  a  body  as  the  Tenement-house 
Commission,  of  physicians  and  trained  nurses  of  the 
highest  standing  makes  it  impossible  for  the  League 
to  withhold  this  evidence  from  the  public.  The  men- 
ace to  the  great  multitude  of  innocent  buyers  is  so  im- 
mediate and  so  grave  that  agitation  should  not  rest 
until  every  buyer  can  have  at  the  retail  store  an 
absolute  guarantee  that  the  purchased  garment  is  not 
from  a  sweatshop  or  a  tenement,  but  is  made  under 
conditions  so  open  to  proper  inspection  as  to  insure 
to  the  worker  a  tolerable  existence,  and  to  the  home 
where  the  garments  are  worn  immunity  from  disease. 

Here  is  a  kind  of  cheapness  that  means  an  early 
and  decrepit  age,  an  unfit  parenthood  with  offspring 
that  are  to  be  mere  vehicles  of  that  stunted  and 
wretched  lineage  which  is  the  shame  and  peril  of  our 
common  life.  If  the  sweatshop  spread  diphtheria 
and  typhus,  there  is  the  hue  and  cry  before  personal 
danger.  But  these  diseases  are  the  very  slightest 
elements  of  the  real  risk  to  the  general  good.  It  is 
the  spoiled  human  life  with  its  deadly  legacy  of 
enfeebled  mind  and  body  that  reacts  directly  and 
indirectly  on  the  social  whole. 

Look  again  at  the  problem  of  child  labor  which  the 
new  economic  conditions  of  the  South  have  rapidly 
developed. 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          253 

A  perfectly  competent  committee  has  published  a 
report  upon  this  subject  from  which  I  quote  a  single 
page :  — 

"From  1870  to  1880,  of  those  employed  in  the 
cotton  factories,  the  number  of  men  over  sixteen 
years  of  age  increased  92.8  per  cent,  the  women  over 
sixteen  years  of  age  increased  77  per  cent,  and  the 
children  under  sixteen  years  of  age  increased  140.9 
per  cent. 

"From  1880  to  1890  the  number  of  men  over  six- 
teen years  of  age  increased  21.8  per  cent,  the  women 
over  sixteen  years  of  age  increased  269  per  cent,  and 
the  children  under  sixteen  years  of  age  increased 
106.5  Per  cent- 

"From  1890  to  1900  the  number  of  men  over  six- 
teen years,  of  age  increased  79  per  cent,  the  women 
over  sixteen  years  of  age  158.3  per  cent,  and  the 
children  under  sixteen  years  of  age  increased  270.7 
per  cent ! 

"According  to  the  official  report  for  1899  from  the 
Labor  Bureau  of  North  Carolina,  the  state,  represented 
by  Colonel  D.  A.  Tompkins,  and  the  only  state  of  the 
South  presenting  an  official  report  upon  labor  statis- 
tics, less  than  10  per  cent  of  the  operatives  in  the 
textile  mills  of  that  state  were  under  fourteen  years 
of  age.  But,  according  to  the  report  of  1901,  those 
under  fourteen  constituted  nearly  18  per  cent  of 
the  whole  number.  Of  the  total  of  45,044  textile 
operatives,  7996  (shall  we  say  8000  ?)  are  under  four- 
teen years,  and  the  average  wage  of  the  child  has  de- 
creased from  32  cents  to  29  cents  per  day.  (See  page 
212  of  the  North  Carolina  Report  of  Department  of 
Labor  and  Printing  for  1899,  and  page  187  of  Report 


254  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

of  same  department  for  1901.)  The  daily  wage  of 
the  factory  children  of  the  South  is  often  as  low  as  1 5 
cents  ;  it  is  sometimes  as  low  as  9  cents.  The  North 
Carolina  figures  also  indicate  that  there,  as  elsewhere 
throughout  the  South,  the  number  of  little  girls 
among  the  employees  far  exceeds  the  number  of 
boys."  i 

I  have  heard  some  disputing  about  the  literal  ac- 
curacy of  some  of  these  figures.  It  is  claimed  both 
that  they  are  overstated  and  that  they  are  understated. 
But  no  greater  exactness  of  statement  will  modify 
the  ugly  meaning  of  the  page.  One  has  here, 
besides  the  manufacture  of  cotton,  the  manufacture 
of  future  inequalities  on  an  immense  scale  —  in  ten 
years  an  increase  of  children  in  these  factories,  270.7 
per  cent ! 

More  than  twenty  thousand  children  are  at  work 
in  these  mills  at  the  present  moment.  It  is  the 
opinion  of  some  Southern  investigators  that  one-third 
of  these  are  under  ten  years  of  age.  This  means  a 
heavy  legacy  of  future  inequalities.  It  is  of  course 
natural  that  from  the  poorer  farming  districts,  fami- 
lies should  flock  to  the  factories  for  the  higher  wage 
that  the  entire  family  can  earn.  With  no  legislative 
protection,  the  deadliest  form  of  the  "family  wage" 
is  substituted  for  the  wage  of  the  natural  bread- 
winner. If  he  have  dead-beat  instincts,  he  can  lounge 

1  "  The  Case  against  Child  Labor,"  an  argument  by  Edgar  Gardner 
Murphy  of  Montgomery,  chairman  of  the  executive  committee  on 
Child  Labor  in  Alabama.  The  other  members  of  the  committee  are 
Ex-Governor  Thomas  G.  Jones,  Judge  J.  B.  Gaston,  and  Gordon  Mac- 
donald  of  Montgomery  ;  John  Craft  of  Mobile  ;  A.  J.  Reilly  of 
Birmingham,  and  Dr.  J.  H.  Phillips,  superintendent  of  schools  of 
Birmingham. 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY          255 

at  the  saloon  upon  the  money  which  his  wife  and 
children  earn.  One  finds  them  in  every  Southern 
mill-town.  It  is  under  these  conditions  that  every 
variety  of  a  vicious  truck  system  of  wage  payment 
springs  into  existence.  One  wanders  about  in  some 
of  these  communities  in  a  kind  of  dream,  as  if  he  had 
been  spirited  back  into  an  English  factory  town  of 
two  generations  ago. 

A  common  argument  to  justify  this  great  wrong 
is  that  as  England  had  to  pass  through  this  stage  so 
must  the  South  pass  through  it.  This  is  an  excuse, 
it  is  not  an  argument.  The  very  meaning  of  social 
politics  is  that  it  gathers  experience  for  practical  use 
in  just  such  issues  as  child  labor.  There  is  no  need 
that  we  should  pass  through  all  the  desolating  stages 
of  that  former  experience.  In  the  England  of  1825 
there  was  no  precedent.  Aside  from  the  splendid 
achievements  of  the  English  acts  and  preventive 
legislation  coupled  with  popular  education,  our  own 
states,  like  Connecticut,  Minnesota,  and  Massachu- 
setts, have  legal  limitation  as  to  age  and  compul- 
sory school  attendance  which  check  these  evils  at 
their  source.  A  competitor  of  Robert  Owen,  who 
pronounced  legal  interference  with  child  labor  the 
"  maudlin  sentimentalism  of  those  who  knew  neither 
business  nor  human  nature,"  had  been  making  in 
the  cotton  business,  according  to  his  own  admission, 
two  hundred  per  cent  in  yearly  profits.  Yet  he 
and  his  fellows  held  that  they  could  not  afford  to 
dispense  with  child  labor  because  that  would  drive 
business  out  of  England.  The  Southern  mills  do  not 
make  such  profits,  but  some  of  them  make  thirty  per 
cent,  and  use  the  same  argument  that  they  cannot 


256  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

afford  to  do  away  with  the  child's  help,  because  of 
Northern  competition.  Northern  capitalists  have 
more  humiliation  in  this  wickedness  than  Southern, 
because  the  main  issue  has  been  long  under  discus- 
sion in  the  North.1  Compulsory  school  attendance 
during  the  period  in  which  employment  is  prohibited 
is  now  required  in  seven  states.  In  every  instance 
where  this  has  been  enforced,  as  in  Massachusetts, 
there  has  been  no  difficulty  in  keeping  children  out 
of  industries. 

In  Pennsylvania,  in  an  atmosphere  thick  with  black 
dust  and  vibrating  with  the  roar  of  the  crushers,  one 
may  see  an  army  of  breaker  boys  sorting  the  coal 
and  picking  slate.  Hundreds  of  these  children  can- 
not be  above  ten  and  eleven  years  of  age.  The 
parents  sanction  a  lying  certificate  of  age,  and  the 
employers  are  indifferent.  After  three  or  four  years 
at  the  breaker,  they  pass  to  the  mine  proper.  Equal- 
ity of  opportunity  in  no  conceivable  sense  belongs  to 
these  boys.  If  they  had  been  born  crippled  or 
stupid,  that  inequality  would  be  out  of  our  control, 
but  much  of  the  handicap  under  which  they  now 
struggle  can  be  removed.  Three  or  four  years  of 
school  at  this  age  multiplies  life's  chances  for  every 
one  of  these  youths. 

Especial  emphasis  is  here  given  to  those  instances 
that  have  to  do  with  the  child  defrauded  of  its  educa- 
tional rights,  because  education  in  its  best  and  larg- 
est sense  carries  the  deepest  hope  of  all  ultimate 
attainable  equalities.  Careful  training  for  one's 

1  The  absurd  differences  in  the  standard  of  industrial  regulation  in 
our  various  states  has  this  advantage  for  the  student,  that  it  enables 
him  to  bring  into  vivid  comparison  a  score  of  conflicting  policies. 


THE  MASTER  PASSION  OF  DEMOCRACY 

tasks  is  two  or  three  times  more  necessary  than  it 
was  in  times  that  old  men  still  remember.  Excep- 
tional force  will  overcome  these  barriers  with  little  or 
no  schooling,  but  commonplace  and  average  capacity, 
that  has  to-day  scant  and  slovenly  training,  is  disad- 
vantaged  as  never  before  in  history. 

If  we  bring  the  least  disposition  toward  fair  inter- 
pretation, we  may  now  see  what  the  best  spokesmen 
in  the  labor  and  socialist  movement  ask.  As  they 
frankly  recognize  the  final  passing  away  of  the 
Utopian  stage,  as  they  recognize  the  uselessness  of 
isolated  colony  schemes,  their  conception  of  social 
equality  is  no  longer  a  visionary  freak,  but  has  as 
much  soberness  as  most  of  our  saner  social  ideals. 

The  "  passion  of  the  democracy  "  has  the  perfectly 
rational  aim  that  is  expressed  in  the  term  "  multiply 
life's  chances."  It  is  a  quantitative  expression.  No 
influence  that  society  has  at  command  could  give 
complete  equality  to  these  breaker  boys  or  to  the 
child  victims  in  Southern  mills.  Yet  we  can  give  a 
great  deal  more  equality.  If  the  reader  wonders 
why  so  poor  a  platitude  requires  statement,  the 
answer  is  that  these  simple  facts  are  necessary  to 
show  that  the  best  of  our  socialist  critics  are  asking 
merely  for  these  further  steps  toward  the  more  equal 
life.  They  are  asking  for  what  all  fair  men  admit  to 
be  a  just  and  rational  aim  in  social  bettering.1 

1  The  question  of  equality  could  of  course  have  no  complete  discus- 
sion without  including  the  first  practical  purpose  of  a  militant  collec- 
tivism, —  to  socialize  the  means  of  production  and  to  use  the  resources 
of  a  fairer  system  of  taxation  to  strike  at  the  present  roots  of  economic 
privilege.  These  sources  of  inequality  are,  however,  a  part  of  the  dis- 
cussion in  the  entire  volume. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

SOCIALISM  :    HISTORY   AND    THEORY 

THERE  is  no  audience  before  which  it  is  safe  to 
speak  upon  this  subject  without  careful  definition  of 
terms.  The  stock  definition  is  the  appropriation  by 
society  of  the  means  of  production.  But  if  socialism 
is  taken  at  its  highest  point  of  development,  general 
definitions  will  gain  in  clearness  if  they  are  preceded 
by  some  reference  to  history,  and  especially  if  experi- 
ments now  under  trial  are  carefully  considered. 

Some  one  has  collected  "  ten  thousand  definitions 
of  religion."  One  could  gather  as  many  of  socialism. 
The  propelling  thought  behind  it  has  so  changed 
during  the  last  century  that  one  seems  to  be  dealing 
not  with  one  thing,  but  with  many. 

The  explanation  is  that  from  the  point  of  view  of 
history,  socialism  has  been  a  growth,  reflecting  upon 
one  side  social  and  trade  conditions  of  the  time; 
upon  the  other  the  ideals  of  the  writer.  These  have 
changed,  just  as  ideals  have  changed  in  education, 
in  politics,  and  in  religion.  The  socialism  of  the 
French  Revolution  differs  from  that  of  our  day  as 
the  science  and  the  politics  of  that  day  differ  from 
our  own.  It  is  well  to  know  something  of  this  his- 
tory, but  to  define  socialism  in  the  terms  of  these 
earlier  dreams  is  misleading.  Communism  is  as  old 
as  human  society ;  socialism  is  essentially  modern  and 

258 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  259 

is  hardly  conceivable  apart  from  the  capitalism  which 
created  it. 

Socialism  is  often  defined  as  a  philosophy,  and  so 
limited,  it  is  legitimate  to  use  large  abstractions  about 
equality,  fraternity,  and  justice.  These  abstractions, 
however,  fail  us  at  the  point  where  our  need  of  light 
is  greatest.  That  society  should  be  just,  free,  and 
fraternal  wins  ready  assent,  but  how  is  this  splendid 
goal  to  be  reached?  Campanella,  Bacon,  and  St. 
Simon,  as  Plato  before  them,  tell  us  we  have  only  to 
make  the  wisest  and  best  men  our  political  officials. 
This  would  be  our  plan  also,  but  we  are  poor  bunglers 
in  carrying  it  into  practical  effect.  We  are  now  and 
then  very  eloquent  about  the  good  man's  political  re- 
sponsibility, but  are  vexed  to  death  to  know  the  ways 
and  means  through  which  1ho  v.  "sest  and  best  can  be 
selected  to  govern  us,  and  kept  in  their  places.  The 
difficulty  has  not  been  with  the  statement  of  prin- 
ciples, but  in  their  everyday  application.  Thus 
socialism,  in  its  merely  philosophic  aspects,  leaves 
our  hardest  questions  still  unanswered. 

Again  socialism  is  treated  as  a  religion.  Poetic 
license  here  reaches  its  climax.  We  are  told  that 
socialism  is  "a  life,"  that  it  is  a  "religion,"  that 
it  is  an  "  aspiration."  1  The  difficulty  with  this  phras- 
ing is  that  it  fails  to  distinguish  its  object  from 
twenty  others.  If  socialism  is  a  life,  a  religion,  an 
aspiration,  so  are  Buddhism  and  Christianity  ;  so  is 
the  Faith-cure ;  so  are  the  Ethical  Societies.  These 
vague  uses  of  the  term  are  not  more  objectionable 
than  it  is  to  make  socialism  merely  an  affair  of 

1  Proudhon  said  in  1848,  "  Le  Socialisme  c'est  toute  aspiration  vers 
1'amelioration  de  la  Societe." 


260  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

economic  and  business  reorganization.  It  has  its 
philosophy,  it  is  a  religion.  To  forget  this  is  to  deal 
not  with  a  whole,  but  with  a  fragment.  The  truth 
still  remains  that  for  purposes  of  definition  the  eco- 
nomic and  political  aspects  require  special  emphasis, 
because  only  through  them  do  we  learn  how  the 
blessings  of  a  more  equal  life  are  to  be  secured.  We 
need  to  know  about  questions  of  method  and  of 
practical  procedure.  For  this  purpose,  at  least  a 
little  history  is  indispensable. 


History 

For  fervor  of  influence,  French  speculation  is  of 
the  highest  consequence.  Napoleon  said  of  Rous- 
seau, that  without  him  there  would  have  been  no 
revolution.  The  "  later  revolution  of  July "  was 
directly  influenced  in  its  social  aspects  by  the  writ- 
ings of  St.  Simon.  Great  business  organizers  like 
Leclaire,  Boucicaut,  and  Godin  were  stirred  to  very 
brilliant  practical  achievement  by  the  poets  of  social 
reorganization.  It  is  yet  true  that  these  dreamers 
throw  less  light  on  our  subject  than  the  soberer 
thinking  of  English  writers.  Among  French  Uto- 
pias, that  of  Fourier  is  perhaps  the  noblest  of  all. 
No  one  ever  saw  the  evils  of  competition  with  a 
keener  eye  or  described  them  with  a  livelier  wit.  He 
sees  that  association  must  replace  the  coarse  struggle 
of  self-seeking.  But  the  main  part  of  his  philosophy 
is  a  hopeless  and  discredited  metaphysic.  It  is  based 
on  a  theory  of  human  passions.  His  "  Theory  of  the 
Four  Movements"  attempts  to  explain  how  Deity 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND   THEORY  26l 

manipulates  the  social  mechanism ;  how  He  divides 
the  passions  ;  how  He  classifies  forms,  substances, 
properties,  and  colors.  To  understand  these  systems, 
his  disciples  were  to  master  impossible  geometric 
theorems,  "  impassioned  attractions  and  unitary  im- 
passioned series."  No  one  outside  an  asylum  would, 
I  think,  pretend  to  see  the  causal  connection  between 
this  theosophy  and  any  existing  practical  reform.  No 
socialist  now  has  anything  to  do  with  his  phalan- 
stery with  its  clock  tower,  one  garret,  one  kitchen, 
and  one  cellar.  We  know  that  men  and  women 
generally  do  not  like  to  live  in  that  way. 

There  is  that  in  Fourier's  character  for  which  the 
word  "  sublime  "  is  hardly  too  strong.  His  power  to 
sacrifice  for  an  idea,  his  self-devotion,  his  tenacity 
of  purpose,  —  dying  of  sheer  heartache  because  the 
world  would  not  listen  to  him,  —  all  heighten  our 
admiration  of  the  man.  His  speculative  plan  was 
nevertheless  fantastic.  With  the  exception  of  Louis 
Blanc,  this  has  to  be  said  of  all  the  French  Utopians. 
The  unfailing  characteristic  of  these  dreams  is  that 
they  ignore  the  facts  of  industrial  history.  The  im- 
agination runs  riot  without  a  check  from  the  stern 
facts  of  economic  evolution.  There  is  plenty  of  this 
visionary  quality  in  Fourier's  contemporary,  Robert 
Owen,  but  this  Welchman  was  trained  from  child- 
hood under  the  severest  business  responsibilities. 
He  dreams  dreams ;  but  no  man  in  England  was  his 
master  in  managing  a  great  mill.  Owen  was  born 
into  the  kind  of  business  organization  which  has 
created  modern  socialism.  His  own  business  tri- 
umphs were  the  triumphs  of  English  capitalism ;  its 
life  was  his  life.  He  is  very  dull  reading  beside 


262  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Fourier  or  St.  Simon,  but  he  is  far  closer  to  the  com- 
petitive struggle  which  has  forced  socialism  to  leave 
the  thin  air  of  Utopia  for  the  humbler  ground  of 
common  experience.  It  is  through  this  same  expe- 
rience that  every  form  of  continental  socialism  will 
be  compelled  to  pass.  Where  business  is  still  car- 
ried on  under  eighteenth-century  methods,  in  Sicily, 
South  Italy,  and  much  of  Spain,  the  programmes  of 
socialism  are  as  much  in  the  clouds  as  Cabet's  "  Voy- 
ages en  Icarie  "  or  Morelly's  "  Code  de  la  Nature." 
There  is  the  same  taste  for  resonant  phrase,  the 
same  faith  in  abstractions,  the  same  hatred  of  slow 
and  toilsome  preparation.  As  capitalism  has  rapidly 
developed  in  the  larger  towns  of  Northern  Italy,  it  has 
stimulated  socialism,  but  has  made  it  already  a  differ- 
ent thing  from  the  socialism  of  the  more  primitive 
Southern  towns. 

As  modern  industrialism  has  taken  root  in  Ger- 
many, and  as  its  methods  have  been  reflected  hi 
politics,  socialists  during  the  last  twenty  years  have 
approached,  step  by  step,  the  policy  of  the  English 
Fabians,  just  as  Fabians  themselves  have  changed 
into  almost  commonplace  politicians  with  a  more  radi- 
cal, industrial  and  social  programme. 

Another  reason  why  English  tradition  has  excep- 
tional value  is  that  in  no  other  European  country  do 
business  and  commerce  so  obviously  determine  poli- 
tics. Parliament  is  a  mirror  in  which  one  sees  the 
clash  of  interests  among  landowners,  manufacturers, 
and  traders.  Her  wars  are  to  open  or  preserve  mar- 
kets. Probably  in  no  country  have  economists  from 
Adam  Smith  down  had  so  direct  an  influence  upon 
political  leaders.  In  the  United  States  we  have  long 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  263 

since  learned  that  politics  is  mainly  a  struggle  over 
these  same  competitive  interests.  Economic  doctrine 
has,  however,  no  considerable  influence  upon  our  lead- 
ing politicians.  The  business  pressure  acts  upon  them 
directly  and  simply.  The  nineteenth  century  in  Eng- 
land is  invaluable  for  the  student  of  socialism  because 
this  intimate  association  of  business  policy  with  poli- 
tics throws  light  upon  socialist  proposals.  Much 
of  the  earlier  socialism  was  contemptuous  of  poli- 
tics. All  socialism  that  is  becoming  effective  now 
enters  the  political  arena  with  a  very  grim  purpose  to 
fight  out  its  issues  at  the  polls.  Very  important  is  this 
last  century  in  England,  because  the  most  powerful 
of  all  socialist  literary  influences  had  its  impulse  and 
training  there.  Unless  an  exception  is  made  of  the 
"  Wealth  of  Nations,"  no  single  work  upon  econom- 
ics ever  had  greater  influence  than  Marx's  study  of 
capitalism.  In  spite  of  all  perversities,  this  "  Bible 
of  Socialism  "  has  aroused  and  directed  revolutionary 
socialist  thought  during  the  last  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury that  has  been  its  transition  from  capricious 
speculation  to  a  great  and  threatening  political  force. 
This  study  was  made  in  England.  Marx  drew  his 
material  from  parliamentary  records  and  from  dis- 
cussions that  centred  about  the  rising  factory  legisla- 
tion. The  most  telling  of  those  principles  that  are 
used  to  carry  war  into  the  capitalist  camp  were 
taken  boldly  from  English  economists  of  the  first 
rank.  Every  essential  of  the  famous  theory  of  "  sur- 
plus value  "  is  of  English  origin.  The  conception 
that  "labor  produces  all  wealth,"  was  an  economic 
commonplace  of  the  earlier  English  school.  The 
socialist  takes  the  economist  at  his  word.  "  If  labor 


264  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

does  create  all  wealth,  why  should  not  labor  have  it 
all  ? "  No  formula  has  ever  been  used  with  more 
deadly  effect  in  the  field  of  popular  agitation.  Marx 
modifies  it  by  his  doctrine  of  average  social  labor ; 
but  for  purposes  of  propaganda  it  still  goes  down  in 
many  of  the  most  recent  socialist  programmes  in  its 
simplest  form,  "  labor  alone  produces  wealth,  labor 
alone  should  have  it."  It  detracts  little  from  this 
author's  original  power  to  say  that  he  found  his  best 
material  and  his  most  striking  formulas  in  England. 
The  skilled  dialectic  with  which  he  puts  his  material 
to  use,  leaves  him  without  a  peer  in  his  own  field. 
His  method  is  so  applied  to  history  that  all  social 
development  appears  as  inexorable  necessity  before 
which  the  doom  of  capitalism  is  but  an  affair  of  the 
calendar.  No  religious  fatalism  ever  worked  upon 
the  uncritical  imagination  with  more  irresistible  effect. 
As  one  listens  to  the  familiar  phrases  before  an 
average  workingman's  audience,  it  is  evident  that  if 
this  "  scientific  socialism  "  is  not  a  religion,  it  acts 
with  the  same  mysterious  power. 

The  reason  why  England  best  interprets  our  present 
problem  is  that  the  capitalistic  system  first  develops 
on  her  soil.  In  the  very  years  when  France  was 
seething  with  the  unrest  of  the  great  Revolution,  the 
English  were  inventing  and  applying  those  mechanical 
processes  through  which  capitalism  was  to  become 
triumphant.  It  is  at  this  time  that  the  loom,  puddling, 
and  the  steam-engine  work  their  revolution.  As  they 
develop,  industries  are  driven  from  the  private  home 
the  factory  town  emerges,  and  the  tools,  once  owned 
by  the  laborer,  pass  finally  into  the  possession  of  the 
capitalistic  employer.  What  modern  socialism  is 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  265 

fighting  is  the  system  which  rests  on  the  capitalist's 
ownership  of  this  machinery.  This  evolution  in  its 
entirety  is  spread  before  us  in  England  during  the 
nineteenth  century.  The  hunger  for  equality  which 
is  the  real  object  at  which  all  socialism  aims  is  deeper 
among  the  French.  They  have  put  these  demands 
into  more  brilliant  form,  but  for  instruction  as  to  the 
way  through  which  this  equality  may  be  won  they  help 
us  less  than  the  English. 

When  Marx  begins  to  write  down  his  interpreta- 
tion of  English  experience  in  mills,  workshops,  and 
markets,  we  are  introduced  into  a  new  world.  From 
this  period  the  transformation  of  socialism  has  gone 
on  until  its  working  programme  is  as  clearly  intelligi- 
ble, as  in  any  political  party  in  the  world.  It  is  at 
the  present  moment  far  more  definite  than  the  pro- 
gramme either  of  our  republican  or  democratic  party 
in  the  United  States.  Neither  liberal  nor  tory  in 
England  shows  a  political  purpose  so  concrete  as  that 
of  the  socialists.  Their  aims  may  be  wild  or  danger- 
ous, they  are  not  vague  and  indefinite. 

II 

Illustrations  of  Theory 

If  modern  socialism  is  fighting  the  system  which 
rests  on  private  ownership  of  the  means  of  production 
(land  and  machinery),  upon  what  theory  is  the  attack 
justified  ?  Why  should  it  be  thought  that  because 
land,  banks,  railways,  telegraph,  and  mills  are  owned 
and  carried  on  for  private  profit  that  therefore  the 
labor  world  is  robbed  of  a  portion  of  its  earnings  ? 
The  completest  theory  is  that  of  Marx,  but  many  of 


266  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

the  clearest  headed  among  the  socialists  have  come 
to  disbelieve  the  forms  in  which  he  expressed  it. 
They  admit  that  labor  does  not  produce  all  wealth 
(even  as  modified  by  Marx),  they  admit  that  labor  is 
not  held  to  the  "  mere  subsistence  line,  "  but  may 
get  increased  wages  and  added  comforts.  They  are 
learning  that  Marx's  conception  of  concentrating 
capital  is  more  than  doubtful  in  agriculture  and  is 
sharply  limited  in  many  other  industries.  His  whole 
materialistic  view  of  history  is  denied  outright  by 
many  of  the  best-equipped  socialists.  But  socialism 
has  not  been  discredited  because  of  this  passing  of  the 
master.  Nowhere  do  socialists,  who  have  lost  faith 
in  the  special  theoretic  forms  of  Marx,  show  less 
loyalty  to  the  cause  or  less  hatred  to  capitalism.  They 
still  believe  that  labor  is  exploited,  and  that  the  wage 
system  is  vicious.  Behind  this  belief  is  still  a  theory — 
a  theory  which  may  easily  be  stated  in  copy-book  form, 
but  for  the  purposes  here  in  view,  a  variety  of  il- 
lustrations that  are  happily  at  hand  from  a  dozen 
different  fields,  will  throw  more  light  even  on  the 
theory. 

Perhaps  the  most  persistent  and  universal  demand 
of  socialism  is  that  labor  should  receive  the  entire 
product,  not  of  course  the  manual  laborer  alone,  but 
all  those  as  well  who  organize,  direct,  and  invent. 
This  does  not,  as  popularly  supposed,  include  the 
capitalist.  The  capital  as  capitalist  is  money  lender 
and  not  worker.  The  working  employer  so  often  at 
the  same  time  furnishes  capital  that  worker  and 
capitalist  are  confused.  Socialists  object,  not  to  the 
worker,  but  to  the  money  lender  buying  and  control- 
ling machinery  and  land  for  his  personal  profit. 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  267 

Competent  critics  of  socialism  like  Dr.  Menger  hold 
that  this  claim  of  labor  to  the  total  product  is,  not 
only  the  most  fundamental  principle  in  socialism,  but  the 
most  revolutionary  force  of  the  present  age.  Even  if 
true,  so  abstract  a  statement  as  the  laborer's  claim  to 
the  total  product  leaves  our  most  important  questions 
unanswered.  What  theoretic  justification  exists  for 
this  claim  ? 

It  is  that  as  industry  is  now  organized  it  gives  back 
to  the  worker  far  less  than  his  labor  has  produced. 
The  reason  of  this  is  that  an  enormous  unearned 
increment  is  perpetually  abstracted  in  the  form  of 
interest,  rent,  and  profits.  Those  who  depend  solely 
upon  interest,  rent,  or  profits  from  their  machinery 
are,  according  to  this  view,  living  upon  income  that  is 
earned  by  others.  Henry  George  and  his  followers 
have  popularized  this  view,  so  far  as  it  concerns  the 
rent  of  land.  George  held  that  rent  derived  from 
land  was  income  that  the  owner  did  not  earn.  Rent, 
he  said,  arises  from  the  growth  of  the  community, 
not  from  anything  the  private  owner  does.  Rent  is 
wholly  a  social  product,  and  should  therefore  go  to 
its  creator,  the  community.  George  was  not  a  social- 
ist, because  he  did  not  apply  this  theory  of  rent  to 
interest  and  profits.  These  he  would  leave  as  pri- 
vate possessions.  The  socialist  believes  that  not 
only  rent,  but  interest  and  profits  on  goods  made  for 
the  market  are  also  a  social  product.  Quite  as  much 
as  rent  they  represent  an  unearned  increment. 
They,  too,  are  social  rather  than  individual  products, 
and  should  therefore  pass  to  their  owner  —  society. 

But  what  theoretical  defence  can  be  offered  for  the 
social  origin  of  wealth  as  distinct  from  the  individual 


268  THE  SOCIAL   UNREST 

origin  ?  In  what  sense  can  it  be  said  that  the  com- 
munity helps  the  millionnaire  to  create  his  fortune  and 
possibly  the  larger  portion  of  it  ?  The  answer  of  the 
collectivist  is  that  an  analysis  of  practically  all  the 
great  fortunes  will  show  that  the  possessors  earned, 
by  personal  service,  only  a  trifling  part  of  their  mill- 
ions. Ground  rents  heap  up  the  treasures  of  the 
New  York  Astors.  The  elder  Vanderbilt  lays  the 
great  railway  into  the  West;  but  the  social  additions — 
lands,  city  terminals,  and  crowding  population — enrich 
it  with  values  far  beyond  any  service  that  any  one 
person  can  render.  It  may  be  oil,  gold,  copper,  iron, 
coal,  coupled  with  special  transportation  privileges 
cunningly  secured  through  the  politician ;  it  may  be 
a  privilege  like  rebates  wrung  from  a  corporation 
like  the  railroad  which  is  semi-public  and  social  in 
character.  The  collectivist  insists  that  every  one  of 
these  dazzling  incomes  can  be  traced  to  an  origin 
that  is  far  more  social  than  individual.  To  keep  and 
to  restore  this  social  increment  in  all  its  forms  is  the 
aim  of  economic  socialism. 

The  department  stores  also  offer  a  good  illustra- 
tion. As  in  Chicago,  Boston,  and  New  York,  these 
stores  are  geographically  so  related  to  the  machinery 
of  transportation  that  the  multitude  is  deposited  at 
their  very  doors.  Of  a  great  Chicago  firm,  I  have 
heard  it  said,  "  It  seems  as  if  the  trolley  cars  were 
made  for  that  store."  It  and  a  dozen  others  are  so 
grouped  that  every  form  of  transportation  is  to  their 
immediate  gain.  If  more  trains  run,  if  they  run 
more  rapidly,  if  fares  are  lowered,  the  advantage 
goes  automatically  to  these  emporiums  of  trade. 
Every  extra  franchise  that  the  city  grants  adds  to 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  269 

their  possessions.  It  is  the  dawning  realization  of 
this  that  begins  now  to  create  dislike  of  these  cara- 
vansaries. When  a  lower  street-car  fare  was  pro- 
posed in  Chicago,  an  unexpected  opposition  developed 
among  thousands  of  people  who  said,  "  Cheaper 
fares  and  then  just  so  many  more  people  will  ride  to 
the  State  Street  stores.  Towns  near  Chicago  oppose 
excursion  trains  because  they  see  that  those  who 
return,  are  loaded  down  with  things  bought  at  the 
great  stores.  Some  one  has  called  steam  and  electric 
transportation  "  the  most  revolutionary  fact  in  the 
last  century."  It  makes  the  New  England  farmer 
poor,  but  fills  the  department  store  to  overflowing.  I 
heard  an  attorney,  who  does  the  business  for  one  of 
the  largest  of  these  institutions,  say,  that  when  the 
people  came  clearly  to  understand  that  every  improve- 
ment in  streets,  sidewalks,  and  traffic  was  a  free  gift 
to  the  department  store,  they  would  subject  them  to 
heavy  special  taxation. 

The  socialist  theory  is  that  the  prosperity  of  these 
stores  is  in  large  degree  owing  to  this  network  of 
improved  inventions  which  brings  customers  so  easily 
to  the  counters ;  it  is  owing  to  the  growing  popula- 
tion which  steam  and  electricity  have  gathered  to- 
gether. This  view  carries  George's  theory  of  rent  on 
to  profits  as  it  also  extends  it  to  interest. 

This  theory  of  the  three  rents  is  expressed  in  many 
forms,  as  when  Schaeffle  writes,  "  The  Alpha  and 
Omega  of  socialism  is  the  transformation  of  private 
and  competing  capitals  into  a  united  collective  capi- 
tal." Or  the  English  Fabians,  "Socialism  means  the 
organization  and  conduct  of  the  necessary  industries 
of  the  country,  and  the  appropriation  of  all  forms  of 


2/O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

economic  rent  of  land  and  capital,  by  the  nation  as  a 
whole,  through  the  most  suitable  public  authorities, 
parochial,  municipal,  provincial,  or  central." 

Whatever  form  the  definition  takes,  there  is  to-day 
no  clearly  conceived  socialism  that  does  not  aim  first 
of  all  at  the  socializing  of  the  "three  rents."  If 
socialism  were  to  triumph  and  be  carried  to  logical 
completeness,  no  individual  could  draw  a  penny's  in- 
come from  interest,  rent,  or  profits.  These  would  pass 
to  the  community.  That  they  may  pass  to  the  many, 
rather  than  to  the  few,  is  the  reason  why  in  all  these 
programmes  the  same  demands  are  made.  The  state 
must  take  the  railroad  and  the  telegraph,  as  eventually 
it  must  take  the  mill  and  the  factory.  The  city  must 
take  the  lighting  and  the  street-car  lines  in  order  to 
divert  earnings  from  the  private  to  the  public  pocket. 
The  socialist  would  have  the  community  carry  on 
these  enterprises  so  that  accruing  interest  and  profits 
may  become  the  property  of  all,  or  managed  (as  we 
were  recently  told  by  a  high  official  from  New  Zea- 
land) strictly  for  the  use  of  the  people  with  no 
thought  of  making  profits.  "We  hope,"  he  said, 
"to  manage  our  railroads,  our  mines,  our  insurance 
companies  as  you  manage  your  post-office,  solely  to 
serve  the  whole  people  and  not  chiefly  as  profit-mak- 
ing machines  in  which  a  small  minority  of  the  people 
can  invest  their  surplus  in  order  to  become  coupon- 
mongers."  1 

So  to  organize  industry  that  the  coupon-monger  in 
every  form  shall  be  suppressed  is  the  raison  d'etre  of 
socialism.  It  stamps  this  occupation  as  that  of  the 

1  Chief  Justice  Clark  of  Tasmania  now  in  this  country  (Nov.  1902) 
gives  unqualified  approval  to  this  general  policy. 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY 

parasite,  or,  in  rougher  terms,  the  real  dead  beat  of 
modern  society  is  to  the  socialist,  not  the  tramp  and 
petty  sponger,  but  those  who  live  upon  rent  and  inter- 
est-bearing property. 

Only  a  part  of  the  socialists  now  hold  to  the  logical 
consequences  of  this  theory.  If  forced  to  the  letter, 
no  woman  could  use  her  sewing-machine  to  make  an 
apron  or  shirt  for  sale  on  the  market.  She  would 
become,  with  the  rest  of  the  parasites,  a  profit  mon- 
ger. A  Massachusetts  socialist,  twenty  years  ago, 
was  cocksure  that  he  should  live  to  see  the  big  stores 
in  Boston  swallow  up  practically  all  the  little  ones. 
Since  then  every  variety  of  small  local  store  has  so  in- 
creased that  it  is  doubtful  if  (per  thousand  of  the  popu- 
lation) there  was  ever  so  large  a  number  in  the 
history  of.  the  city.  The  tenacity  with  which  small, 
freely  competing  businesses  retain  their  hold  has 
made  it  clear  that  an  enormous  part  of  profit-mak- 
ing services  is  here  to  stay  for  such  an  indefinite 
future  that  all  opinions  about  their  duration  have  as 
much  value  as  most  fanciful  guessing  about  the 
unknown. 

Thus  the  cannier  socialists  direct  attention  to  those 
fields  upon  which  competition  has  given  place  to 
combination.  Here  especially,  if  monopoly  character 
is  shown,  is  the  harvest  white  for  the  socialist  sickle. 
At  this  point  many  economists,  refusing  the  socialist 
creed,  are  in  heartiest  agreement  with  it  in  one 
respect.  They  admit  that  these  monopolistic  com- 
binations may  draw  away  from  the  people  in  form  of 
profits  far  more  wealth  than  is  their  due.  This  may 
be  done  by  business  chicane  as  through  overcapitali- 
zation ;  it  may  be  done  through  political  influence  that 


272  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

secures  special  privileges,  like  rebates  that  weaker 
competitors  cannot  secure.  It  is  for  this  whole  class 
of  large  enterprises,  based  on  privilege  and  monopoly 
of  some  kind,  —  businesses  in  which  competition  has 
passed  into  the  stage  requiring  control  in  the  public 
interest,  —  that  many  socialists  now  ask  public  in  the 
place  of  private  ownership.  As  other  industries  one 
by  one  reach  this  stage,  they  too  are  to  be  taken  from 
private  hands. 

That  so  many  collectivists  now  confine  their  claims 
to  this  part  of  the  industrial  field  raises  a  nice  point 
for  speculative  discussion.  Does  the  term  "  socialist " 
necessarily  apply  to  one  who  believes  that  only  that 
part  of  industry  is  to  be  "  socialized  "  which  reaches 
the  stage  just  indicated?  If  one  believe  that  the 
larger  part  of  the  world's  work  is  to  pass  into  "com- 
bines "  that  cannot  long  be  trusted  in  private  hands, 
the  word  "  socialist "  properly  belongs  to  him.  If  the 
greater  portion  of  industry  —  the  "pace  setting" 
part  of  it  —  is  to  be  publicly  controlled,  the  word 
"socialism"  would  fitly  characterize  such  a  society.  If, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  should  prove  that  ponderous 
organization  can  cover  but  a  portion  of  the  field ;  if 
it  prove  that  a  still  larger  portion  of  industry  still  re- 
mains in  open  competition,  "  socialism  "  as  a  blanket 
term  cannot  be  applied  to  that  society.  It  will  have 
large  and  vigorous  socialistic  functions,  but  others, 
larger  and  more  vigorous,  that  are  individualistic.  If 
competitive  and  relatively  small  industries  are  to  re- 
main the  "  pace  setters,"  individualism  fairly  describes 
that  condition.  If  again  it  turn  out,  as  is  not  unlikely, 
that  the  industrial  world  reach  a  kind  of  equilibrium 
under  which  competitive  and  individualistic  energies 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  273 

stand  in  some  counter-weight  and  balanced  relation 
to  collectivist  functions,  what  then  becomes  of  either 
name  ? 

An  older  German  socialist  worker  and  author  once 
said  to  me,  with  much  indignation :  "  Your  new  op- 
portunists, like  the  English  P"abians  and  our  Vollmar, 
are  confusing  every  principle  on  which  our  fight  is  to 
be  made.  No  one  is  a  socialist  who  does  not  believe 
that  all  interest,  rent,  and  profits  are  to  be  socialized. 
A  half-and-half  industry  is  more  contemptible  as  an 
ideal  than  the  present  organized  robbery  of  competi- 
tion." This  view  has  probably  had  its  day  because 
so  much  evidence  is  at  hand  that  both  art  and  science 
in  their  larger  sense  must  inevitably  develop  individ- 
ually as  well  as  through  organization.  There  is  that 
in  organization  which  has  the  tendency  to  blight  the 
art  spirit  just  where  we  most  need  its  newest  and 
most  original  expression.  One  of  our  best  American 
wood  carvers  was  thrown  into  a  rage  by  an  invitation 
to  join  a  trade  union.  Does  any  genuine  artist  doubt 
that  art  suffers  under  the  commercial  organizations 
and  companies  that  exploit  it  for  profit?  It  is  true 
that  many  artists  call  themselves  socialists  in  their  hot 
reaction  against  this  same  commercialized  tyranny; 
but  I  have  rarely  seen  one  who  was  not  in  his  ideal, 
anarchist,  like  William  Morris,  and  not  properly  so- 
cialist. They  were  hungering  for  the  extreme  indi- 
vidualism and  freedom  of  the  anarchist's  dream. 
The  interminable  discussion  that  continues  over  the 
metaphysics  of  anarchism  and  collectivism  furnishes 
curious  proofs  that  the  race  sets  no  such  value  upon 
anything  as  upon  freedom  and  individuality.  What- 
ever name  we  apply  to  a  society  which  secures  these 


2/4  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

gifts,  it  will  surely  be  one  —  unless  the  race  deterio- 
rates—  in  which  liberty,  variety,  and  individuality 
shall  have  progressively  freer  scope. 

Whatever  may  be  said  of  the  "  new  socialism  "  with 
its  opportunist  yielding  to  larger  experience,  the 
socialist  with  a  formula  will  neither  get  nor  deserve 
in  the  future  very  serious  attention.  A  universal 
formula,  like  that  of  "  the  three  rents,"  will  fare  no 
better  than  the  others.  As  the  dialectic  of  the  artistic 
passion  destroys  every  distinguishing  phrase  between 
socialism  and  individualism,  so  science,  in  its  enlarging 
applications,  may  extend  the  regime  of  private  prop- 
erty holdings  in  which  interest,  rent,  and  profits  in  a 
thousand  small  industries  may  prove  more  fruitful  to 
society  than  if  they  are  socialized.  It  is  no  longer  a 
mere  hope  that  power  may  soon  be  so  widely  and 
cheaply  distributed  as  to  give  distinct  economic  ad- 
vantage to  a  large  variety  of  small  industries.  When 
a  better  manual  and  art  training  has  become  a  part  of 
our  entire  education,  so  that  no  child  shall  escape  its 
influence,  artistic  industries,  experimental  and  indi- 
vidualized, are  not  unlikely  to  spring  into  luxuriant 
existence.  The  probability  is  exceedingly  slight  that 
this  movement  will  carry  with  it  an  elimination  of 
private  ownership  in  the  individualistic  sense.  Nor 
will  it  be  different  with  the  whole  inspiring  promise 
of  agriculture  when  science  has  really  vitalized  it. 
Then  will  work  in  the  fields  and  upon  the  soil  have 
the  fascination  of  the  studio  and  the  laboratory. 

A  former  member  of  the  New  Zealand  government 
said  in  this  country,  "We  mean  to  organize  all  our 
great  industries  more  and  more  so  that  they  shall  not 
be  used  to  make  individuals  rich,  but  every  advantage 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  2/5 

of  cheaper  service  or  cheaper  products  shall  go  at 
once  to  the  whole  body  of  the  people."  I  know  of  no 
completer  definition  of  socialism  than  to  say  that  any 
country  in  which  all  the  important  industries  were 
carried  on  upon  this  principle  would  be  a  strictly 
socialistic  society. 

No  source  for  illustration  of  this  theory  is  fairer 
than  that  which  New  Zealand  and  the  Australian 
colonies  offer.  Here  is  a  people  with  self-help  tradi- 
tions like  our  own.  The  country  is  relatively  new, 
has  exhaustless  natural  resources,  has  won  a  great 
prosperity,  yet  the  state  invades,  one  by  one,  the  fields 
where  private  enterprise  has  been  supreme.  Not 
only  are  railroad,  telegraph,  and  street  car  under 
community  ownership,  but  also  a  very  different  order 
of  undertakings,  state  banking,  life  insurance,  loan 
funds  for  farmers  worked  through  the  agency  of  the 
post-office.  Cooperative  sugar  mills,  cold  storage, 
irrigation,  the  exportation  of  products,  cooperative 
use  of  workmen  with  the  avowed  purpose  of  eliminat- 
ing the  contractor,  are  instances  of  government  enter- 
ing the  field  of  private  enterprise,  organizing  and 
carrying  on  business,  not  first  to  make  money,  but  to 
serve  the  people  by  managing  these  various  agencies 
directly  for  their  benefit.  I  do  not  maintain  that  it  is 
done  with  signal  success.  A  good  deal  of  it  appears 
to  me  to  be  poorly  done;  but  the  object  is  socialistic, 
showing  us  by  illustration  how  the  collectivist  word 
becomes  flesh.  It  is,  moreover,  very  conscious  of  its 
aim :  to  narrow  the  margin  of  enterprises  in  which 
rents  and  profits  go  to  private  persons.  By  so  far 
as  the  government  acts  in  these  affairs,  the  field  for 
private  money  making  is  diminished.  A  responsible 


2/6  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

minister  of  the  government  says,  "We  propose  to 
use  the  full  power  of  the  state  to  lessen  the  sway  of 
the  private  capitalist." 

The  prime  minister  of  New  Zealand  is  taunted 
with  frightening  private  capital  out  of  the  coal  busi- 
ness. He  replies,  that  the  government  will  before 
long  work  its  own  mines.  The  minister  of  railways 
points  to  the  advantage  of  having  no  stockholders 
to  whom  dividends  must  be  paid.  Another  official 
glories  in  the  fact  that  the  abuses  of  the  Stock 
Exchange  are  diminished  in  direct  ratio  as  govern- 
ment does  business  for  the  people. 

From  the  socialist  point  of  view  it  is  an  irreparable 
debauching  of  the  people,  so  to  organize  industry, 
that  dividend-bearing  stocks  shall  be  listed  by  the 
thousands  upon  the  Stock  Exchange  of  every  city 
and  town.  This  is  a  necessity  of  a  dividend  and 
profit-making  regime.  The  "  dead-beat  hunger  "  of 
the  race  to  get  something  for  nothing  is  thus  aroused 
and  a  pernicious  speculating  fever  spreads  among 
the  people.  Honest  investments,  it  is  maintained, 
play  but  an  insignificant  role  in  this  vast  gambler's 
game.  I  asked  a  New  York  stock  broker  what  dif- 
ference it  would  make  in  his  business  if  he  did  business 
only  with  those  who  came  to  invest.  He  said,  "  I  should 
perhaps  do  one-tenth  of  the  business  I  now  do."  Mr. 
Carnegie's  opinion  ought  to  be  very  valuable  on  this 
subject.  He  has  just  used  these  words :  "All  pure 
coins  have  their  counterfeits ;  the  counterfeit  of  busi- 
ness is  speculation.  A  man  in  business  always  gives 
value  in  return  for  his  revenue,  and  thus  performs  a 
useful  function ;  his  services  are  necessary  and  benefit 
the  community ;  besides,  he  labors  steadily  in  develop- 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY   AND   THEORY  2/7 

ing  the  resources  of  the  country,  and  thus  contributes 
to  the  advancement  of  the  race.  This  is  genuine 
coin.  Speculation,  on  the  contrary,  is  a  parasite 
fastened  upon  the  labor  of  business  men.  It  creates 
nothing  and  supplies  no  want.  When  the  speculator 
wins,  he  takes  money  without  rendering  service  or 
giving  value  therefor ;  and  when  he  loses,  his  fellow- 
speculator  takes  the  money  from  him.  It  is  a  pure 
gambling  operation  between  them,  degrading  to  both." 

All  that  is  true  in  these  charges,  the  socialist  holds 
to  be  now  inevitable.  If  these  natural  treasures  are 
open  to  every  adventurer  to  be  fenced  off  as  a  field 
for  private  exploitation,  they  will  be  made  an  agency 
to  play  upon  the  fortune-hunting  instinct  of  the 
people.  For  every  honest  company,  a  score  of  bogus 
ones  will  be  put  upon  the  market  and  tempt  the 
unwary  by  lying  prospectuses  in  the  press.  The 
remedy  wanted  is  state  ownership  with  such  regula- 
tion as  shall  secure  these  riches  to  the  public,  and 
so  order  this  industry  as  to  prevent  its  becoming  the 
most  perverted  of  lotteries. 

The  socialist  sees  again  the  swift  and  sickening 
waste  of  our  forests.  The  private  profit  maker,  eager 
for  quick  gains,  lays  the  great  hills  bare,  with  no 
concern  for  flood  or  drought.  The  socialist  insists 
that  the  public  welfare  is  too  much  endangered  by 
the  dividend  and  profit  hunter  in  this  field.  When 
the  state  owns  the  forest  or  subjects  private  owner- 
ship to  the  strictest  regulation,  the  devastation  ceases. 
Forest  culture  is  then  like  the  growing  of  any  other 
crop,  only  with  slower  returns. 

In  the  mining  of  precious  metals  and  with  the 
forests,  according  to  this  view,  one  only  sees  a  little 


2/8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

more  clearly  the  damage  incurred  through  the  indi- 
vidual appropriation  of  the  "three  rents." 

English  Fabians  now  ask  for  the  municipalization 
of  the  drink  traffic.  There  are  moral  dangers  con- 
nected with  this  trade  which  distinguish  it  practically 
from  ordinary  industries,  yet  it  illustrates  admirably 
the  socialist  theory.  In  Norway  and  Sweden  it  long 
since  came  to  be  believed  that  individual  profit-mak- 
ing in  the  retail  liquor  trade  was  socially  dangerous. 
Legislation  based  upon  the  principle  of  local  option 
now  turns  profits,  formerly  made  by  the  individual 
saloon  keeper,  into  the  public  treasury.  Under  the 
"  Application  of  Socialism  to  Particular  Problems,"  J 
English  socialists  now  advocate  this  principle  in 
their  own  country.  As  they  would  municipalize 
water,  gas,  tramways,  docks,  pawnshops,  slaughter- 
houses, and  bakeries,  so  they  would  turn  the  dividends 
now  made  by  the  private  venders  of  intoxicants  into 
the  town  treasury. 

These  instances  of  drink,  forests,  and  mines  differ 
only  in  degree  from  other  industries  that  constitute 
a  source  from  which  the  individual  may  draw  income 
in  the  form  of  rents.  Evil  inheres  in  every  transac- 
tion that  bears  this  unearned  income  of  private  divi- 
dends. There  is  no  completion  of  the  socialist  theory 
until  industry  is  so  managed  by  the  community  that 
interest,  rent,  and  profit  are  "  socialized  "  —  are  turned 
from  private  into  public  possessions.  It  is  the  social- 
ist's faith  that  until  this  is  done,  a  portion  of  what 
labor  earns  will  go  to  those  who  have  given  no  equiv- 
alent for  it.  To  restore  his  unearned  income  to  the 
whole  people,  the  means  of  production  —  land  and 

1  Tracts  85  and  86. 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND   THEORY  2/9 

machinery  —  must  pass  to  social  ownership.  The 
conservative  cry  against  all  this  is  that  "  it  destroys 
private  property."  If  it  were  charged  that  certain 
forms  of  private  property  would  be  destroyed,  the 
criticism  is  just.  There  is  in  theory  no  destruction 
of  private  property  further  than  that  involved  in 
these  "three  rents."  A  hundred  forms  of  property 
(slaves,  highways,  toll-bridges)  have  changed  and 
must  change  with  advancing  civilization.  Commu- 
nism in  all  its  extremes  destroys  private  property 
outright.  Socialism  safeguards  it  to  the  extent  of 
giving  absolute  rights  to  the  individual  over  all 
products  that  he  can  hold  for  consumption.  It  is 
legitimate  for  the  critic  to  urge  the  practical  objec- 
tion that  social  control  of  land  and  capital  would 
dull  the  working  ardor  of  the  race,  and  thus  create 
a  product  -so  diminished  that  both  private  and  public 
income  would  suffer.  This  as  a  practical  result  might 
prove  true.  The  socialist  theory  on  the  other  hand 
assumes  that  the  industrial  product  would  increase 
when  "  the  tools  were  again  in  the  hands  of  the 
people."  Up  to  date  there  is  alarmingly  little  proof 
of  this,  but  it  is  a  strictly  practical  issue  and  can  alone 
be  determined  by  long  and  severe  tests  in  adminis- 
trative work.  Before  dealing  with  the  collective 
principle  at  work  in  its  most  advanced  form,  two  ques- 
tions should  be  asked,  neither  of  which  admits  of  a 
too  final  and  confident  answer. 

(i)  Are  the  economic  and  political  forces  now  at 
work  bringing  to  the  broad  mass  of  the  people  such 
wages  that  they  will  feel  themselves  gaining  abso- 
lutely and  relatively  in  the  varying  prosperity  of  the 
age  ?  A  strong  case  can  be  made  out  in  nine-tenths 


280  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

of  our  industries  to  show  that  the  wage  earners' 
yearly  income  purchases  an  increasing  share  of  life's 
comforts.  But  relatively  do  the  masses  gain  in  any 
such  ratio  as  the  more  favored  classes  ?  There  are 
many  statistical  attempts  to  prove  this,  but  I  have 
nowhere  seen  a  sign  that  it  carried  convincing  proof 
to  the  laborer.  There  is  a  very  general  admission 
among  them  that  they  do  gain  in  nominal  and  in 
real  wages.  Among  those  who  make  this  admission, 
there  is  an  absolute  scepticism  about  a  progress  that 
stands  in  any  fair  relation  to  the  acquisitions  of  the 
well-to-do.  I  have  heard  the  best  statistical  authority 
known  to  me  in  the  United  States  deny  that  rela- 
tively the  masses  get  anything  like  their  fair  share. 

If,  then,  it  should  slowly  become  clear  that  a  widen- 
ing gap  is  opening  between  the  "  rich  and  the  poor," 
most  of  the  points  I  have  tried  to  make  against  the 
older  revolutionary  socialism  lose  their  force.  I  do 
not  believe  this  to  be  true,  but  if  it  should  prove  so ; 
if  the  gulf  is  deepening  between  the  "  haves  "  and  the 
"  have  nots,"  we  are  upon  the  dizzy  edges  of  a  class 
struggle  and  a  consequent  revolution.  It  is  blankly 
inconceivable  that  we  can  rapidly  democratize  educa- 
tion, as  we  are  now  doing,  and  at  the  same  time  have 
it  visibly  appear  that,  in  any  real  sense,  the  rich  are 
growing  richer  and  the  poor  poorer,  without  a  des- 
perate social  struggle.  A  social  system  that  made 
such  a  result  possible  would  stand  self-condemned 
before  all  fair  men.  To  destroy  it  or  remodel  it 
would  become  the  most  sacred  of  duties. 

(2)  It  must  also  be  admitted  that  if  the  principles 
of  "  regulation  "  prove  too  weak  to  curb  the  power 
of  the  corporations,  the  socialistic  propaganda  will 


SOCIALISM:    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  28 1 

take  on  bolder  and  more  ominous  forms.  There  are 
very  unhappy  indications  that  many  of  our  commis- 
sions, whose  function  it  is  to  "  regulate "  corpora- 
tions in  the  public  interest,  either  have  no  real  and 
commanding  control,  or  they  merely  protect  the 
investor. 

The  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  has  done  its 
best  for  years  to  "  regulate  "  the  railways ;  to  check 
the  manipulated  special  privileges  upon  which  colos- 
sal private  fortunes  have  been  built  in  this  country. 
Year  after  year  the  reports  of  this  Commission  betray 
its  helplessness  either  to  get  right  information  or  to 
get  adequate  power  to  produce  results  for  which  the 
Commission  was  established.  Will  the  grant  of  fur- 
ther powers  so  fortify  this  body  that  it  can  do  any- 
thing which  the  railroads  are  unitedly  determined 
shall  not  be  done  ?  The  picked  skill  and  talent  in 
the  law  is  theirs;  national  and  state  legislatures  are 
filled  with  able  men  to  do  their  bidding. 

Other  corporations,  according  to  their  strength, 
have  the  same  weapons  of  defence.  If  the  thing  to 
be  regulated  prove  more  adroit  and  masterful  than 
the  regulator,  the  alternative  of  government  owner- 
ship will  appear  natural  and  inevitable.  It  will  be 
said  that,  with  railways  in  the  hands  of  the  govern- 
ment, the  highest  legal  skill  and  ability  may  there  be 
used  to  defend  the  public.  I  once  heard  a  German 
economist  ask  the  question,  "  How  can  you  in  the 
States  help  having  great  difficulties  as  long  as  private 
interests  are  so  overwhelming  that  they  command 
nine-tenths  of  the  best  lawyers  ?  You  ought,"  he  said, 
"  at  least  to  have  such  a  balance  of  public  business 
(like  railroads,  telegraphs,  etc.)  that  you  would  have 


282  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

as  many  strong  lawyers  to  fight  for  the  public  as 
there  are  to  fight  against  it." 

Whatever  is  thought  of  the  merits  of  this  argument, 
it  will  carry  weight  in  proportion  as  the  inefficiency  of 
the  regulative  principle  becomes  clear.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  possibilities  of  "  regulation  "  have  had  thus 
far  no  real  test.  Only  half-hearted  beginnings  have 
been  made.  As  its  need  becomes  a  life-and-death 
matter,  we  may  meet  it  with  requisite  seriousness  and 
strength.  We  get  much  comfort  by  repeating,  "  If  the 
emergency  is  startling  and  grave  enough,  the  Ameri- 
can rises  to  the  occasion."  This  has  been  so  true  in 
the  three  or  four  greatest  crises  of  our  history,  that 
our  resources  may  not  fail  us  in  this  last  trial  of  our 
good  sense.  Before  we  topple  over  into  a  socialistic 
community,  the  principles  of  regulation  will  be  put 
to  full  trial,  nor  can  their  promise  and  adequacy  be 
determined,  apart  from  the  possible  cooperation  of 
our  strongest  business  men.  Within  ten  years  many 
of  them  have  learned  that  affairs  of  great  magnitude 
are  to  be  henceforth  carried  on  in  an  entirely  differ- 
ent atmosphere  of  public  opinion.  They  know  that 
they  are  to  be  held  to  a  new  accountability. 

I  have  heard  this  opinion  from  a  man,  not  quite  to 
be  classed  with  the  half-dozen  giants,  yet  commonly 
associated  with  them :  "  Whether  we  want  to  or  not, 
we  shall  be  forced  to  do  business  in  a  new  way.  I 
think  we  do  it  now  in  the  public  interest,  but  so 
many  people  do  not  think  so,  that  we  shall  have  to 
take  that  into  account.  With  this  socialistic  spirit  of 
discontent  everywhere  growing,  we  have  got  the  hard 
task  of  proving  to  the  public  that  we  can  manage 
things  better  than  the  government  or  the  city.  If  we 


SOCIALISM:   HISTORY  AND  THEORY  283 

can't  do  that,  our  day  is  done."  Given  enough  of  that 
feeling  with  the  purpose  to  act  upon  it,  and  the  regu- 
lative principle  has  many  added  chances  of  success. 

The  great  issues  are  thus  seen  to  depend  in  larger 
degree  upon  the  moral  and  intellectual  character  of 
our  most  masterful  business  men.  No  "  regulation  " 
can  hinder  them  if  they  are  bent  alone  on  personal 
gain. 

There  is  no  conclusion  that  does  not  halt  before 
this  inquiry  as  to  the  future  conduct  of  our  business 
leaders.  If  social  responsibility  is  flouted,  nothing 
can  stay  the  progress  of  a  turgid  and  dangerous  po- 
litical socialism. 

Yet  it  can  be  shown  that  socialism  may  develop  so 
safely  as  to  become  simply  the  advanced  political 
radicalism  of  the  time  — a  radicalism  that  must  stand 
before  the  -people  on  its  merits  as  a  social  servant. 
If  it  can  bake  our  bread,  weave  our  cloth,  mine  our 
coal,  and  manage  transportation  with  more  efficiency 
and  less  corruption  than  under  the  private  profit-mak- 
ing system,  the  public  will  be  the  gainer ;  but  we  shall 
not  take  the  promises  of  socialism  without  perform- 
ance. We  shall  watch  its  attempts  to  light  a  city 
until  we  are  convinced  that  it  can  do  it,  without  leav- 
ing a  burden  of  taxation  on  the  public  to  eke  out 
slovenly  management  and  a  depreciated  plant.  Nine- 
tenths  of  city  and  state  business  is  so  imperfectly  done 
that  the  public  is  right  in  demanding  proofs  and  strict 
accounts  from  this  new  stewardship. 

Its  tasks  are  of  incomparably  greater  difficulty  than 
the  book-makers  would  have  us  believe.  In  our  own 
case,  for  example,  if  the  government  take  the  railroads, 
it  will  have  the  quite  appalling  duty  of  fixing  rates  for 


284  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

competing  industries  in  different  sections.  It  will 
have  to  do  this  in  politics.  Those  in  Congress  who 
represent  the  fruit  industry  of  the  South  and  the  fruit 
of  the  far  West,  must  struggle  before  committees  in 
Congress  to  get  advantages,  or  prevent  competitors 
from  getting  them.  This  has  plagued  the  German 
government  more  seriously  than  the  public  has  been 
allowed  to  know.  These  political  difficulties  are  a 
profound  weakness  in  Australia,  as  they  would  prove 
with  us.  It  is  fair  to  reply,  "  But  the  railroads  are  in 
politics  already,  and  that  in  the  most  secret  and 
irresponsible  ways ;  the  state  would  have  to  control 
them  politically,  but  at  least  all  the  chicane  and  blun- 
dering would  come  out  before  the  public." 

The  answer  is  not  without  force.  I  have  known 
two  citizens,  with  large  private  interests  in  their  re- 
spective cities,  take  their  place  in  the  city  council. 
After  two  years  both  refused  reelection.  One  said  : 
"  It's  not  worth  while ;  most  of  the  time  is  taken  up 
with  petty  contests  and  political  trading.  There  is 
so  little  relation  between  anything  that  I  can  do  and 
the  larger  public  concerns,  that  I  shall  never  advise 
any  one  with  important  affairs  on  his  hands  to  waste 
his  time  as  I  have  done." 

The  other  said  :  "  I  gave  it  up  because  I  found  why 
the  strongest  men  in  the  city  are  indifferent  to  city 
politics.  It  serves  their  private  interests  to  have  a 
poor  and  purchasable  city  council.  They  know  that 
it  is  poor  and  wasteful ;  but  directly  and  indirectly 
they  make  more  money  by  using  politics  to  defend 
their  private  interests." 

Students  of  socialism  have  long  said  that  this 
"  apathy  of  the  eminent "  would  continue  until  those 


SOCIALISM  :    HISTORY  AND  THEORY  285 

larger  businesses  based  on  franchises  passed  into  the 
hands  of  the  city.  "When  the  whole  business  of 
managing  the  things  that  touch  us  to  the  quick  — 
gas,  electric  lights,  water,  street  cars,  etc.  —  has  to  be 
done  at  the  City  Hall,"  then,  urge  the  socialists, 
"  every  imperfection  and  dishonesty  will  so  strike  at 
the  pockets  of  the  citizens,  that  they  must  perforce 
see  to  it  that  able  and  honest  men  alone  are  intrusted 
with  city  affairs." 

I  have  heard  this  opinion  from  a  German  mayor 
in  a  town  that  owned  meat  markets,  gas,  telephone, 
water,  and  street  service,  "The  citizens  cannot  help 
attending  to  their  political  duties,  because  bad  manage- 
ment would  cost  them  too  much  and  subject  them  to 
such  inconvenience." 

It  is  considerations  of  this  character,  together  with 
the  broadening  experience  of  European  cities,  that 
make  it  impossible  to  shirk  the  ordeal  of  thorough 
comparative  tests.  It  is  to  these  tests  that  we  must 
henceforth  trust  rather  than  to  any  a  priori  pretence 
of  speculation  as  to  what  the  city  and  state  can  do  or 
cannot  do.  No  trial  of  these  different  administrative 
experiments  could  be  fairly  made  until  within  very 
recent  years.  Both  trade  unionism  and  socialism  had 
to  pass  through  stages  of  the  severest  discipline  and 
experience  before  any  adequate  comparison  between 
socialistic  and  private-profit  methods  were  possible. 

These  changes  have  now  come.  It  is  my  conten- 
tion that  they  offer  to  us,  as  a  people,  a  perfectly  fair 
chance,  (a)  to  use  the  stupendous  force  at  work 
through  the  aggregations  of  labor  in  ways  that  shall 
make  these  bodies  more  and  more  conservative  of 
every  social  value  consistent  with  a  growing  democ- 


286  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

racy,  and  (fr)  to  prepare  ourselves  for  an  oncoming 
socialism,  so  that  it,  too,  shall  become  an  aid  rather 
than  a  hindrance  to  a  more  decent  human  society. 

As  socialism  has  been  commonly  conceived,  I  do 
not  believe  it  brings  an  answer  to  a  single  one  of 
our  deepest  life  questions,  but  on  the  outposts  of  its 
development  it  is  undergoing  extraordinary  transfor- 
mations which  we  shall  see  at  their  best  in  France. 


CHAPTER   IX 

SOCIALISM    IN   THE    MAKING 

EXCEPT  for  many  unhappy  experiments  of  Utopian 
character,  socialism  until  recent  years  has  shown  no 
trace  of  positive  and  constructive  workmanship.  It 
has  been  the  critic  of  the  existing  industrial  order. 
If  it  had  rendered  no  other  service,  this  activity  of 
relentless  censorship  would  justify  it.  Much  of  the 
best  social  legislation  on  the  continent  of  Europe  is 
traceable  directly  to  social  agitation.  Bismarck  was 
blamed  for  making  the  admission,  "  If  there  were 
no  social  democracy,  and  if  many  were  not  afraid  of 
it,  even  the  moderate  progress  which  we  have  hith- 
erto made  in  social  reform  would  not  have  been 
brought  about."  The  greater  part  of  socialist  ener- 
gies is  still  critical,  and  in  this  sense  negative.  The 
days  of  the  mere  fault-finder  are,  however,  numbered. 
This  change  marks  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  the 
movement.  So  long  as  it  played  the  part  of  caviller, 
it  took  no  responsibilities,  nor  could  its  pretensions 
be  tested. 

Within  the  brief  period  of  five  or  six  years  it  has 
become  possible  to  apply  a  new  and  far  more  search- 
ing criticism  to  socialism.  So  long  as  it  was  a  mere 
dream,  so  long  as  men  felt  it  only  as  a  hope,  so  long 
as  it  remained  in  the  realm  of  theory  and  speculation, 
the  only  weapons  that  could  be  turned  against  it 

287 


288  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

were  as  unsubstantial  as  any  that  socialists  them- 
selves used.  The  patronizing  strictures  of  the 
practical  man  were  as  airy  and  doctrinaire  as  any 
claims  put  forth  by  Marx,  Jules  Guesde,  or  William 
Morris.  A  library  of  books  and  pamphlets  has  been 
written  to  show  the  limits  of  human  nature,  the 
limits  of  corporate  capacity,  the  limits  of  what  the 
city  or  the  state  may  legitimately  undertake.  Time 
and  events  have  not  dealt  kindly  with  these  opinions. 
Corporations  now  perform  hundreds  of  services  that 
earlier  writers  thought  altogether  beyond  their  scope. 
States  and  cities  organize  and  carry  on  enterprises  so 
various  that  the  older  theories,  "  what  the  state  can 
do  and  what  it  cannot  do,"  are  very  queer  reading. 

As  long  as  social  innovators  were  making  fancy 
sketches  of  a  perfect  society,  criticism  was  scarcely 
less  fanciful.  When  the  dream  period  passes  into 
experiment,  the  possibilities  of  critical  observation 
first  appear.  A  stage  of  socialistic  development  has 
now  been  reached,  concerning  which  one  may  form 
as  distinct  a  judgment  as  upon  the  results  of  the 
weather  bureau  or  the  sloyd  system  of  education. 
Socialism  now  enters  upon  the  formidable  task  of 
social  reconstruction.  One  may  roughly  mark  four 
stages  in  its  growth.  It  was  long  Utopian,  then  under 
Lassalle's  guidance  it  became  political,  passing  thence 
into  state  and  municipal  activities  that  are  strictly 
socialistic.  This  third  stage  is  strangely  enough  no- 
where the  work  of  socialists,  but  of  tories,  political 
liberals,  or  military  governments.  Its  final  form  is 
to  unite  politics  with  cooperative  business,  as  in 
Belgian  cities. 

At  the  point  where  socialism  begins  to  show  itself 


SOCIALISM   IN  THE  MAKING  289 

a  force  to  reckon  with  in  politics,  its  positive  influence 
begins.  We  can  measure  it  by  the  compromises  and 
concessions  wrung  from  the  party  in  power.  The 
years  immediately  following  the  Franco-Prussian  war 
mark  the  rise  of  its  political  influence  in  Germany. 
The  law  of  1884,  which  permits  the  trade  unions  to 
unite,  marks  it  in  France.  In  Belgium  its  extraordi- 
nary career  had  an  even  later  beginning.  Socialists 
now  sit  upon  the  councils  of  more  than  a  hundred 
towns  in  France,  and  many  of  the  communes  are  polit- 
ically controlled  by  socialists,  subject  to  the  veto 
of  the  prefect.  This  veto  represents  the  grip  which 
an  extremely  centralized  government  has  upon  local 
administration.  Although  the  suffrage  is  practically 
as  free  as  in  the  United  States,  the  limits  are  very 
narrow  within  which  a  town  council  can  introduce  a 
change  of  policy.  I  have  tried  in  many  cities  to  see 
what  socialistic  steps  have  actually  been  taken.  With 
two  socialists  in  the  government  and  nearly  a  million 
votes,  actual  performance  is  singularly  lacking.  Here 
one  finds  a  drug  store  taken  by  the  city,  "  to  be  run  not 
for  the  enrichment  of  the  petit  bourgeois,  but  for  all 
the  inhabitants."  There  it  is  the  city  printing,  the 
elimination  of  the  private  contractor,  or  a  pawnshop 
in  exact  imitation  of  those  long  existing  in  most  of 
the  French  towns.  Again,  the  city  is  bread  maker  or 
the  supplier  of  milk. 

Grenoble  owns  a  restaurant  which  furnishes  daily 
more  than  twelve  hundred  meals.  The  city  owns 
the  land  and  the  nine  buildings  upon  it.  That 
the  competition  may  not  be  unfair  against  private 
eating-houses,  rent  is  paid  to  the  city,  but  the  element 
of  profit  to  any  individual  is  eliminated.  If  at  the 


290  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

year's  close  a  profit  has  been  made,  it  goes  to  the  city 
treasury  as  a  reserve  fund  to  be  used  when  the  price 
of  foods  is  exceptionally  high.  It  is  thus  run  strictly 
upon  socialistic  principles  for  social  use  and  not  for 
private  profit.  With  the  exception  of  the  restaurant 
at  Grenoble,  all  this  is  the  result  of  socialist  activity 
during  the  last  fifteen  years. 

The  first  surprise  is  to  find  how  different  the  expe- 
rience has  been  in  large  towns,  like  Roubaix  and 
Lille,  from  the  calculated  municipalization  of  German 
and  English  cities.  A  score  of  these  show  an  exten- 
sion of  city  functions  far  beyond  all  that  has  been 
done  in  French  towns  that  have  for  years  had  social- 
ist mayors  and  a  socialist  majority  upon  the  town 
council.  The  government  veto  accounts  for  much 
of  this  backwardness ;  but  the  bourbon  character 
of  the  French  socialism,  its  abstract  and  uncom- 
promising quality,  accounts  for  more.  The  haughty 
disdain  of  the  Latin  collectivists  to  work  for  modest 
social  improvements  with  any  human  being  who  is 
not  of  the  true  faith,  still  confines  their  activity 
to  fields  that  bear  at  best  a  stunted  fruit. 

The  most  sober  and  restrained  statement  one  could 
give  of  the  party  activity  down  to  the  last  congress, 
would  be  largely  the  description  of  feuds  and  brawls 
of  almost  incredible  character.  The  party  led  by 
Jaures  and  Millerand,  a  member  of  the  cabinet,  has 
reached  some  steadiness  of  constructive  purpose.  It 
has  learned  that  cooperation  with  other  social  agencies 
is  a  necessity.  In  this  spirit,  Millerand  entered  the 
Ministry  of  Waldeck-Rousseau.  The  storm  at  once 
broke  over  the  cas  Millerand.  In  this  consent  of  a" 
collectivist  to  work  with  a  bourgeois  government,  the 


SOCIALISM  IN  THE  MAKING  29 1 

other  socialist  parties  see  only  a  sinister  attack  upon 
the  sacred  principle  of  the  class  struggle.  The  dis- 
cipline of  events  and  the  increasing  influence  of  men 
like  Jaures  will  in  time  cure  this  doctrinaire  folly ; 
meanwhile  we  have  to  look  to  the  humbler  work 
within  the  commune  to  see  the  completed  picture  of 
socialism  in  the  making. 

In  most  towns  I  asked  the  mayor  or  his  secretary 
what  had  been  done  to  realize  the  socialist  ideal. 
Many  communities  have  had  from  eight  to  ten  years' 
experience  with  collectivist  administrators.  The  first 
and  often  the  paramount  occupation  has  been  to  vote 
larger  budgets  in  favor  of  the  poor.  Sometimes  the 
aged  poor  in  almshouses  are  given  new  freedom  with  an 
extra  stipend  for  pin  money.  Sometimes  it  is  to  build 
a  new  creche  or  enlarge  the  older  ones.  If  mothers 
had  previously  paid  small  sums,  this  indignity  is 
omitted.  Often  a  large  sum  is  voted  to  feed  school 
children.  I  never  could  find  an  instance  in  which 
it  was  even  claimed  that  any  considerable  thought  or 
care  had  been  given  to  distinguish  between  those  who 
could  pay  and  those  who  could  not.  It  appeared  to 
be  assumed  that  every  workman  who  could  pay  for 
his  children's  food,  would  do  it  from  native  self- 
respect.  It  was  invariably  with  an  air  of  triumph 
that  you  were  told,  "  The  bourgeois  spent  only  50,000 
francs  on  the  poor,  but  we  spent  1 50,000."  In  Roubaix 
the  secretary  said,  "  We  have  given  ten  times  as  many 
pieces  of  clothing  to  the  poor  as  the  bourgeois  ever 
gave."  This  was  considered  final  proof  that  the 
socialists  were  introducing  a  superior  administration. 
The  same  pride  was  shown  in  raising  the  pensions  of 
"  socialist  soldiers" ;  in  paying  the  car  fares  of  certain 


2Q2  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

city  officials;  in  voting  grants  to  the  theatres  and 
free  medical  attendance  to  a  larger  proportion  of  the 
poor.  It  was  thought  a  disgrace  that  the  needy  should 
have  to  go  themselves  for  their  free  bread.  It  was 
therefore  voted  to  deliver  the  bread  at  the  door. 
These  are  strictly  fair  illustrations  of  what  has  been 
attempted  in  a  large  number  of  communes.  It  is  for 
the  most  part  an  extremely  loose  and  promiscuous 
form  of  out-door  relief. 

The  visitor  is  allowed  to  take  copies  of  the  weekly 
Bulletin  Mtmicipal  Officiel,  in  which  the  acts  and 
deliberations  at  the  City  Hall  are  given  to  the  public. 
At  St.  Denis  I  was  permitted  to  take  an  entire  file  of 
copies  from  the  first  issue  on  April  5,  1891.  The 
single  impression  which  these  bulletins  make  upon 
the  reader  is  that  of  a  very  raw  attempt  to  catch  the 
working-class  vote  by  giving  away  the  public  money. 
If  "  Citoyen  Oudin "  has  died,  the  vote  of  the 
city  council,  giving  the  widow  100  francs  and  a 
monthly  pension,  is  printed.  It  is  added  :  "  Nothing 
of  the  old  secrecy  is  now  tolerated.  In  a  democratic 
society  all  things  must  be  open  to  the  public  eye." 
In  two  instances  the  socialists  had  organized  a  ser- 
vice for  widows  with  small  children  that  is  a  model 
of  humane  good  sense.  It  was  wisely  assumed,  unless 
the  family  was  to  be  broken  up,  that  all  the  mother's 
strength  was  due  to  the  care  of  her  little  ones.  She 
was  thus  allowed  a  monthly  pension,  which  she  could 
supplement  by  home  work.  It  was  distinctly  under- 
stood that  the  widow  was  in  no  way  classed  with 
objects  of  charity,  but  received  her  pension  as  the 
soldier  receives  his,  without  loss  of  self-respect.  "  For 
cases  of  this  kind,"  said  my  socialist  informant,  "we 


SOCIALISM   IN  THE  MAKING  293 

do  not  propose  to  spoil  the  whole  family  by  putting 
upon  them  the  stigma  of  pauperism." 

These  rather  startling  attempts  to  cast  out  the 
whole  charity  tradition  do  not  exhaust  all  that  the 
French  collectivists  are  undertaking,  but  they  are  by 
far  the  most  important.  Their  rawness  and  imper- 
fection are  not  to  be  concealed.  It  is  for  this  reason 
that  in  many  communes  the  socialists  have  been  dis- 
lodged. No  severer  test  of  administrative  ability  could 
possibly  be  chosen  than  the  care  of  the  dependent 
poor.  If  human  experience  has  proved  one  thing 
more  clearly  than  another,  it  is  that  the  whole  class 
of  those  who  need  and  claim  assistance  cannot  be 
really  helped  without  extreme  caution  and  discrimina- 
tion. If  the  mayor  says,  "We  collectivists  propose 
to  aid  all  the  poor  and  ask  no  questions,"  he  begins 
forth  with 'to  debauch  the  community,  but  far  more 
to  debauch  those  who  are  to  receive  his  aid.  The 
record  of  bourgeois  society  in  dealing  with  the  needy 
lacks  dignity,  as  it  miserably  lacks  effectiveness.  It 
has  shown  a  petty  moral  provincialism  in  its  divisions 
between  the  "  worthy  "  and  the  "  unworthy  "  poor. 
It  has  nevertheless  worked  out,  however  clumsily, 
certain  tests  of  great  value.  The  work  before  us  is 
to  develop  these  so  far  that  every  community  can 
satisfy  itself  whether  those  asking  aid  have  (a)  the 
ability  to  do  any  useful  work,  (b)  whether  they  have 
the  will  to  do  it.  If,  being  able,  they  refuse  after 
fair  chances  are  given  them,  they  should  straightway 
be  put  under  prison  constraint,  preferably  upon  farm 
colonies. 

One  of  the  strong  men  among  the  collectivists 
who  had  struggled  long  with  the  dead  beats  among 


294  THE  SOCIAL   UNREST 

the  poor,  told  me :  "  We  have  got  to  go  a  good  deal 
farther  than  the  bourgeois  dared  to  go.  If  a  man 
can  work  and  won't,  we  shall  put  him  in  the  com- 
pulsory workshop  where  he  can  be  taught,  or,  refus- 
ing that,  he  shall  not  be  allowed  to  escape."  I 
asked  why  his  constituents  made  such  bad  work  of  it. 
"  Oh,  you  know  everybody  is  crazy,  one  way  or  the 
other,  on  that  subject  of  caring  for  the  poor ;  we  have 
all  got  our  lesson  still  to  learn." 

This  chief  effort  in  the  collectivist  communes  has, 
thus  far,  been  to  reorganize  "  public  assistance."  Its 
lack  of  success  is  explained  by  the  theoretic  stage 
which  still  holds  a  large  part  of  the  French  socialism. 
They  approach  this  hardest  of  practical  problems 
with  sonorous  sentences  from  Rousseau.  Before  the 
election  they  placard  the  town  with  sentences  like 
these : — 

La  faim,  c'est  le  crime  public, 

C'est  rimmense  assassin  qui  sort  de  nos  t£nebres. 

They  announce  that  "girl  mothers"  shall  be  freed 
from  all  disgrace;  that  every  badge  and  stigma  of 
misfortune  shall  be  removed ;  that  "  we  do  not  care 
to  know  how  the  misfortune  came,  but  only  if  it  has 
come." 

One  need  not  deny  that  much  nobility  of  motive 
is  expressed  in  these  sentences,  but  they  should  not  mis- 
lead us  into  thinking  that  the  actual  work  of  social  and 
individual  reformation  is  even  begun  by  such  reso- 
nant paragraphs.  Real  performance  is  still  before 
them.  The  socialists  complain  bitterly,  and  with  much 
justification,  that  the  veto  power  of  the  government  is 
so  used  against  them,  that  they  are  left  with  this  hard- 


SOCIALISM  IN  THE  MAKING  295 

est  of  all  problems,  as  if  the  purpose  were  to  discredit 
their  work  before  public  opinion.  But  the  real  weak- 
ness is  in  their  own  lack  of  political  and  business 
discipline.  The  spell  of  abstractions  is  still  upon 
them  to  such  extent  that  personal  wrangling  over 
"  great  and  sacred  principles  "  makes  it  almost  im- 
possible to  get  through  a  congress  that  brings  the 
five  parties  together.  A  Belgian  socialist,  as  success- 
ful in  business  as  he  was  in  parliament,  once  gave 
me  letters  of  introduction  to  some  of  his  friends  in 
France.  He  added :  "  Our  socialist  brothers  over 
there  are  still  in  the  primary  school.  They  are  talk- 
ing about  the  universe,  when  they  have  got  to  learn 
to  manage  a  shop  and  a  small  town.  They  abuse  us 
because  we  are  at  work  at  the  small  end  with  small 
things." 

This  brief  account  would  lack  both  truth  and 
justice,  if  it  failed  to  note  another  high  quality  that  is 
perhaps  at  present  more  useful  to  the  cause  in  France 
than  the  best  "  municipal  housekeeping."  This  is  the 
socialist  appeal  to  the  national  conscience  to  begin 
disarmament.  Under  the  magnetic  leadership  of  the 
scholarly  Jaures,  thousands  of  Frenchmen  are  for  the 
first  time  admitting  the  vast  stupidity  of  the  increas- 
ing military  burdens  of  that  people.  In  the  name  of 
the  working  classes,  Jaures  cries  halt  to  this  criminal 
policy.  With  a  sustained  moral  passion  that  reminds 
one  of  Mazzini,  he  calls  upon  his  countrymen  to  rise 
above  the  petty  provincialism  "  marked  off  by  the 
surveyor's  line,"  and  "  enter  upon  the  ways  that  lead 
toward  self-respect  and  brotherhood."  His  stinging 
utterances  against  the  slowness  and  inactivity  of  the 
Church,  in  this  effort  toward  an  international  morality, 


296  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

has  stirred  multitudes  of  people  in  that  country.  "  Is 
the  work,"  he  asks,  "which  the  professed  followers 
of  Christ  have  so  infamously  neglected,  to  be  done  by 
socialists  ? " 

In  a  great  hall  packed  with  students,  I  once  heard 
a  three  hours'  debate  on  this  subject,  between  a  priest 
and  a  socialist.  It  was  the  heavy  task  of  the  priest 
to  argue,  throughout,  for  the  necessity  of  the  army, 
"  human  nature  being  as  it  is."  Every  popular  catch- 
word about  the  flag  and  patriotism  was  brought  into 
skilful  use,  in  his  apology  for  Christian  nations  in 
their  elaborate  preparations  to  carry  slaughter  and 
death  among  their  fellow-Christians.  Was  not  a 
great  army  and  navy  forsooth  the  best  safeguard  of 
peace  ? 

The  plea  of  the  socialist  was  for  a  policy,  every 
practical  aim  of  which  should  lead  toward  fraternity, 
by  throwing  off  the  express  signs  and  symbols  of 
enmity.  For  a  long  future,  he  admitted  the  neces- 
sity of  a  "home  militia"  for  possible  self-defence,  but 
asked  that  every  youth  be  taught  ethically  that  all 
preparation  for  offensive  war  is  a  crime  against 
humanity  and  the  last  insult  to  the  Christ  tradition 
which  stands  (if  it  stands  for  anything)  for  peace  and 
good  will  among  men. 

I  came  away  from  this  debate  with  a  professor  in 
the  local  university.  He  said  with  much  feeling, 
"To  have  that  debate  here  once  more,  would  un- 
church every  student  in  the  university  and  make  him 
a  socialist,  if  it  has  not  already  done  so." 

It  is  in  this  spirit  that  socialists  are  uniting  in  a 
very  noble  attempt  to  sting  Christian  nations  into 
some  sense  of  moral  shame  because  of  this  great 


SOCIALISM   IN  THE  MAKING  297 

iniquity.     In  this  holiest  of  all  crusades  Jaures  and 
his  followers  are  at  the  front. 

This  "socialism  in  the  making"  will  substitute  work 
for  phrases  as  heavier  and  more  definite  responsibili- 
ties are  thrown  upon  it.  The  process  which  brings 
this  safer  and  saner  mind  is  seen  at  its  best  in  the 
recent  history  of  the  German  movement,  to  which  we 
now  turn. 


CHAPTER  X 

FROM   REVOLUTION   TO   REFORM 

I  SHALL  consider  the  German  and  Belgian  expe- 
rience in  much  detail,  because  it  offers  us  the  best 
possible  criticism  upon  the  socialist  movement  as  a 
whole.  It  represents  it  in  its  later  and  riper  stages. 
I  deliberately  substitute  this  experience  for  speculative 
discussion,  confident  that  this  actual  history  of  failure 
and  success  throws  far  more  light  upon  the  issues  than 
volumes  of  subtle  theorizing.  We  do  not  know  what 
the  socialistic  principle  can  do,  or  what  it  can  not  do. 
It  has  now  made  two  extraordinary  records ;  one  politi- 
cal, the  other  political  and  economic.  It  is  to  these 
records  I  now  refer  the  reader.  They  furnish  lessons 
of  such  obvious  significance  that  there  would  be  little 
hope  for  any  people  who  refused  to  heed  them. 

So  far  as  political  duties  alone  can  steady  men,  the 
German  social  democrats  have  been  at  last  forced  to 
take  step  with  the  great  army  of  those  who  do  the 
ordinary  work  of  carrying  on  the  empire.  Within 
my  own  personal  experience  with  some  of  the  leaders 
of  this  party,  the  change  of  attitude  on  very  vital 
points  has  been  so  radical,  that  one  hesitates  to  state 
it  except  in  their  own  words.  Socialists  are  extremely 
sensitive  about  these  changes  of  opinion  within  their 
own  ranks,  and  I  shall  not  therefore  trust  to  notes 
taken  during  three  years'  residence  in  that  country 
and  during  four  visits  at  more  recent  periods. 

298 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       299 

Even  if  it  somewhat  overload  the  text,  the  most 
authoritative  proofs  should  be  given.  These  changes 
have  been  brought  about  by  the  bearing  of  specific 
responsibilities.  In  Germany  these  are  almost  ex- 
clusively political.  Bamberger,  who  with  the  eye  of 
an  enemy  watched  the  growth  of  social  democracy 
in  Parliament,  told  me  that  what  had  interested  him 
most  was  to  see  the  effect  of  parliamentary  life  upon 
the  outward  behavior,  the  manners  and  dress,  of 
these  representatives  of  the  labor  classes.  "  Even 
those  who  are  most  persistent  in  marking  themselves 
off  by  external  peculiarities,  gradually  get  subdued 
by  their  surroundings,  so  that  in  dress  and  bearing 
strangers  are  bothered  to  know  where  the  socialists 
sit." 

It  is  of  much  more  weight  that  this  subduing  pro- 
cess does  not  affect  the  outside  only,  but  thought  and 
opinion  as  well.  Let  us  take  one  by  one  the  leading 
revolutionary  principles  which  had  the  sacredness  of 
a  religion  to  the  older  German  socialist. 

(a}  After  their  parliamentary  life  began,  men  who 
guided  the  opinion  of  the  party  held,  as  Bellamy 
came  to  believe,  that  the  social  revolution  was  to  hap- 
pen at  a  date  so  near,  that  one  was  safe  in  stating  it 
as  twenty-five  years  at  the  utmost.  The  great  struggle 
was  just  ahead  and  was  to  come  abruptly  to  an  end. 
The  words  of  their  leader,  Bebel,  were:  "For  it 
is  the  last  social  struggle.  The  nineteenth  century 
will  hardly  be  at  an  end  before  this  struggle  shall  be 
practically  ended."  J  He  even  held  that  the  entire 

1 "  Die  Frau,"  p.  352.  (Denn  es  ist  der  letzte  sociale  Kampf.  Das 
19.  Jahrhundert  wird  schwerlich  zu  Ende  gehen,  ohne  dass  dieser 
Kampf  so  gut  wie  entschieden  ist.) 


300  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

plan  of  the  new  society  should  be  worked  out  before- 
hand to  the  last  detail. 

The  Protokoll  of  the  party,  as  late  as  that  at 
Erfurt,  contains  the  sentence,  "  I  am  convinced  that 
the  fulfilment  of  our  hopes  is  so  near  that  there  are 
few  in  this  hall  that  will  not  live  to  see  the  day." 

(£)  It  was  held  and  taught  that  this  triumph  of  the 
social  democracy  could  not  come  peaceably,  but  only 
through  violence  and  bloodshed.  In  1874,  as  the 
strength  of  the  party  began  to  show  itself,  Liebknecht 
was  its  chief  and  most  instructed  popularizer.  He 
writes  in  his  "Volkstaat"  these  words,  "Those  who 
wish  a  new  society  must  work  directly  for  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  old  one."  "  It  is  solely  a  question  of  force 
—  eine  Machtf rage  —  which  is  not  to  be  fought  out 
politically,  but  on  the  battlefield,"  —  die  in  keinem 
Parlament,  die  nur  auf  der  Strasse,  auf  dem  Schlacht- 
feld  zu  losen  ist. —  His  "Zu  Schutz  und  Trutz"  is  also 
filled  with  kindred  expressions. 

At  the  Congress  of  1883  the  words  are,  "A  change 
in  our  industrial  system  through  peaceable  means  is 
unthinkable."  At  St.  Gallen,  in  1887,  it  is  laid  down 
that  one  who  teaches  that  the  social  democratic  ideal 
can  be  reached  by  constitutional  and  parliamentary 
means  is  a  humbug  —  "  er  sei  ein  Betriiger." 

These  are  not  garbled  citations  but  the  deliberate 
opinions  of  the  intellectual  leaders  of  the  party.  The 
proceedings  at  the  Congress  of  Wyden  bear  the  same 
stamp  of  violent  purpose.  Dietzgen's  "  Religion  der 
Socialdemokratie  "  is  filled  with  it.  The  period,  he 
says,  in  which  he  wrote  was  quiet,  but  only  because 
forces  were  gathering  for  a  catastrophe,  —  "weil  sie 
Kraft  sammelt  zu  einer  grossen  Katastrophe."  In 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       301 

1875  Marx  described  the  transition  between  the  capi- 
talistic and  the  final  communistic  society.  Between 
these  two,  he  says,  comes  "die  revolutionare  Dictatur 
des  Proletariats."  In  1891  his  life-long  friend  and 
ablest  colleague  explained  this  sentence  thus :  "  You 
wish,  gentlemen,  to  know  what  this  dictatorship  of 
the  proletariat  means?  Look,  then,  at  the  Paris 
Commune!" 

(c}  The  struggle  was  sharply  defined  —  the  poor 
against  the  rich.  It  was  to  be  the  war  of  the  prole- 
tariat against  the  well-to-do.  In  their  one  scientific 
journal  it  is  written  down,  in  iSgi,1  that  no  people  as 
a  whole  is  to  bring  in  the  new  era.  The  whole  bur- 
den of  the  fight  falls  to  the  workman,  "cine  bestimmte 
Klasse,  namlich  das  Proletariat  innerhalb  aller  civilis- 
irten  Vdlker." 

(d)  As  capitalism  advances,  wages  lessen,  and  the 
masses  sink  into  deeper  want  and  misery  —  in  Marx's 
words,  "  wachst  die  Masse  des  Elends,  des  Drucks 
der  Knechtschaft,  der  Entartung,  der  Ausbeutung." 

(e}  The  teaching  of  the  great  autocrat,  Marx,  that 
industries  would  fall  as  by  nature  into  fewer  and 
fewer  hands,  was  accepted  so  implicitly,  that  when, 
a  few  years  since,  the  first  doubt  was  raised  concern- 
ing this  teaching,  as  applied  to  the  peasant  farmers,  it 
was  met  by  a  storm  of  resentment.  When  Marx  said 
that  the  accumulation  of  riches  at  one  pole  was  at  the 
same  time  the  accumulation  of  wretchedness,  slavery, 
ignorance,  brutalization,  and  moral  degradation  at  the 
other  pole,2  he  included  the  farming  class.  The  keen- 
est and  most  faithful  summarizer  of  Marx  in  England, 

1  "  Die  Neue  Zeit,"  1891-1892,  Heft  9. 

2  "Das  Kapital,"  p.  6n. 


302  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Dr.  Aveling,  says  the  farmer  is  to  be  extinguished 
because  the  revolution  is  even  more  intense  in  agri- 
culture than  among  factories.  In  Germany,  Bebel 
popularizes  this  opinion,  and  Kautsky  taught  that  the 
hopelessness  of  the  farmer  was  inherent  in  the  capi- 
talistic development  of  society.1 

(/)  Nor  can  one  omit  the  question  of  religion  from 
this  list.  Twenty-five  years  ago  the  tone  against  re- 
ligion was  that  of  an  acrid  dogmatic  atheism.  A  sin- 
gle passage  from  Liebknecht's  paper  ("  Volkstaat")  in 
1875  stands  fairly  for  opinions  that  may  be  quoted 
from  twenty  authoritative  sources  :  "  It  is  our  duty  as 
socialists  to  root  out  the  faith  in  God  with  all  our 
zeal,  nor  is  any  one  worthy  the  name  who  does  not 
consecrate  himself  to  the  spread  of  atheism." 

This  is  not  merely  Engles's  word,  "  Mit  Gott  sind 
wir  einfach  fertig  "  ;  it  is  the  "  Zwangs-Atheismus  " 
of  that  period.  In  his  "  Christenthum  und  Socialis- 
mus"  Bebel  says  of  the  Christian  religion,  that  it 
stands  over  against  socialism  as  fire  and  water. 
Dietzgen  claimed  in  his  "  Streifziige  "  that  being  other 
than  man  was  not  possible.  The  Stuttgart  leader 
Schall  was  applauded  when,  in  1871,  he  said,  "We 
open  war  upon  God  because  He  is  the  greatest  evil 
in  the  world." 

I  do  not  give  this  array  of  opinions  to  find  fault 
with  them.  I  give  them  solely  to  show  that  the 
ablest  social  democrats  have  changed  their  attitude. 
Some  of  these  opinions  have  been  cast  out  altogether, 
and  are  now  freely  spoken  of  as  an  exhibition  of 
intellectual  rawness  that  shows  itself  in  the  beginnings 
of  a  new  movement.  Other  points,  like  the  last  one 

1  See  Protokoll,  1895. 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       303 

regarding  religion,  have  not  been  discarded,  but  so 
entirely  modified  as  scarcely  to  be  recognized. 

What  has  occurred  that  so  vital  a  change  should 
have  taken  place  ?  The  general  answer  is  that  the 
strenuous  experience  of  twenty  years  of  political 
agitation  has  given  —  what  is  freely  admitted  —  a 
larger  outlook. 

Let  us  begin  with  the  last  point  (/),  on  religion. 
As  early  as  1889,  it  had  become  clear  to  many  of  the 
shrewdest  in  the  party  that  religion  had  a  much 
deeper  hold  upon  large  classes,  especially  in  the 
farming  district,  than  these  jaunty  critics  in  the  seven- 
ties ever  dreamed.  They  learned  that  religion  was 
a  larger  fact  than  what  they  saw  embodied  in  any 
church,  catholic  or  protestant.  They  learned  that 
even  if  it  were  a  superstition,  generations  must  pass 
before  its  'victims  could  be  disillusionized.  This  had 
become  so  manifest  that  the  Protokoll  of  the  party 
at  Halle  declares  that  religion  must  be  left  to  the 
private  judgment  of  the  individual.  This  is  a  long 
step  from  Liebknecht's  positive  duty  of  the  socialists 
to  root  out  religion  and  (mit  allem  Eifer)  to  spread 
atheism.  It  is  easy,  moreover,  to  account  historically 
for  the  hilarity  with  which,  at  that  time,  men  like 
Liebknecht,  Bebel,  Stern,  and  Dietzgen  mocked  the 
religious  sentiment.  The  "intellectuals"  of  social 
democracy  were  caught  by  the  prevailing  scientific 
current  of  the  time.  About  1870  a  crude  materialism 
was  at  its  height.  Skilful  popularizers  like  Blichner 
were  read  with  eager  zest  by  those  whose  joy  it  was 
to  discredit  the  faiths  of  the  ruling  classes.  "  Wis- 
senchaft "  was  a  word  to  conjure  with.  Liebknecht 
writes,  "  Our  party  is  a  scientific  party."  Before 


304  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

1885,  it  was  a  dull  mind  that  could  not  see  that  this 
kind  of  materialism  was  repudiated  by  all  the  first- 
rate  scientific  minds  in  Europe.1  In  1884  I  heard  a 
university  professor  of  philosophy,  in  strongest  sym- 
pathy with  the  social  democrats,  say,  "  It  is  a  great 
pity  that  the  leaders  of  the  party  do  not  see  that  they 
are  discrediting  their  own  cause  by  repeating  what 
every  instructed  person  knows  to  be  nonsense." 
Many  of  their  leaders  now  recognize  this.  Malon, 
before  his  death,  wrote  pathetic  appeals  to  the  party 
in  Europe  to  "spiritualize  the  movement,"  at  least 
"  to  bring  it  up  to  the  level  of  the  reigning  science." 

In  his  final  work,  "  Le  Socialisme  Integral,"  he 
pronounces  the  economic  materialism  of  Marx  wholly 
untrue  to  the  facts  of  life.2 

In  all  that  was  said  at  the  Congress  in  Halle 
(1891)  about  the  relation  of  the  party  to  religion, 
the  effects  of  this  great  change  are  clear.  Even  if 
policy  alone  dictated  the  altered  tone,  the  proof  is 
just  as  convincing  that  the  party  guides  have  learned 
their  lesson.  When  a  member  says,  especially  of  the 
country  districts,  "  We  get  on  best  when  we  leave 
this  subject  (religion)  entirely  alone,"  3  and  finds  his 
words  approved,  it  is  evident  that  religion  is  recog- 
nized as  a  force  with  which  social  democrats  have  to 
work.  The  Marxian  Woltman  has  recently  written 
a  book  upon  historical  materialism  in  which  he 
teaches  that  religion  is  an  abiding  fact  in  the  life  of 

1  A  brilliant    account   of  this   change  may  be  found  in   Lange's 
"History  of  Materialism." 

2  See  also  Gustave  Rouanet,  "  Revue  Socialiste,"  15  decembre  1887. 
8  Auf  dem  Lande  kommen  wir  mit  der  Religion  am  besten  fort,  wenn 

wir  sie  ganz  aus  dem  Spiel  lassen.  —  Protokoll  zu  Halle,  p.  190. 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       305 

the  race.  Socialism  in  his  view  has  no  more  sacred 
task  than  to  add  deeper  spiritual  purpose  to  all  its 
aims.1  This  is  the  key  to  the  change  in  every  point 
we  are  considering.  At  first  the  arch  sin  is  compro- 
mise with  existing  society.  Its  God,  its  government, 
its  family,  its  cherished  forms  of  property,  are  to  be 
broken  in  pieces.  It  is  treachery  to  every  sacred  prin- 
ciple to  recognize  legal  and  parliamentary  methods, 
since  these  involve  some  sort  of  working  partnership 
with  capitalistic  society.  Yet  that  which  at  first  was 
a  perfidy,  has  slowly  become  a  virtue,  even  if  one  of 
necessity.  Step  by  step  the  inflexible  antagonisms 
have  yielded  to  the  same  influences  that  have  disci- 
plined the  race  from  its  beginnings. 

The  point  (e}  illustrates  this  better  still.  The 
Marxian  abstraction,  that  the  big  fish  of  industry 
are  gradually  destroying  the  little  ones,  has  also  been 
"found  out,  "  i.e.  the  infallibility  of  the  generalization, 
applied  to  all  industry,  is  now  known  to  have  limitations 
undreamed  of  by  the  master.  As  early  as  the  Inter- 
national Congress  of  1868,  through  Marx's  influence, 
it  was  laid  down  that  land  was  to  be  made  common 
property.  This  was  repeated  until  the  International 
was  scattered  by  the  incessant  bickering  of  its  mem- 
bers. In  1870  the  German  party  at  its  Congress  at 
Stuttgart  accepted  this  principle  of  the  International 
because  "  economic  development  made  it  a  necessity 
to  convert  land  into  common  property."  This  was 
to  be  worked  collectively  by  labor  associations.  The 
Congress  at  Gotha,  in  1875,  holds  firmly  to  this  plank 
of  its  platform.  Nearly  twenty  years  were  still  to  pass 
before  any  one  raises  the  question  whether  the  great 

1  L.  Woltman,  "Der  Historische  Materialismus." 
X 


306  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

farming  was  as  a  fact  generally  swallowing  up  small 
proprietors.  As  late  as  1895  a  very  frequent  and 
impressive  illustration,  which  one  often  heard  from 
the  speakers,  was  the  resistless  march  of  the  colossal 
farm  in  the  United  States.  It  was  assumed  that  this 
added  further  proof  of  the  infallibility  of  Marx's 
insight.  Before  the  dispute  upon  this  point  arose,  a 
purely  tactical  issue  appeared,  like  that  which  showed 
itself  at  Halle  in  regard  to  religion. 

The  South  German  socialist,  Von  Vollmar,  knew 
well  the  life  and  the  economic  condition  of  the  small 
farmer.  He  first  saw  that  whether  or  not  the  great 
farming  was  to  replace  the  small,  nothing  was  surer 
than  that  the  owner  of  few  acres  would  straightway 
pronounce  every  man  an  enemy  and  a  blockhead  who 
proposed  to  take  away  this  ownership  and  merge  it 
in  a  collective  proprietorship.  Would  it  not  therefore 
be  better  to  recognize  this  fact  and  adjust  the  party 
policy  to  it  ?  So  universally  was  this  reprobated,  that 
three  years  passed  before  the  slightest  real  impression 
was  made  on  the  party  action.  In  1894,  Von  Vollmar 
was  able  to  make  his  challenge  felt.  He  first  showed 
it  to  be  the  worst  of  tactics  to  outrage  the  traditional 
land  hunger  of  the  peasant.  In  this  same  year,  he 
challenged  the  evidence  that  the  little  farmer  was 
generally  being  despoiled  by  the  great  one.  At  this 
date  it  was  possible  to  get  news  from  America.  From 
letters  and  agricultural  reports  it  was  learned  that  the 
"  big  farm  illustration  "  was  premature.  There  was 
too  little  good  evidence  to  show  that  the  economic 
fatalities  were  strengthening  the  thesis  of  the  prophet. 
The  testimony  was  that  for  large  portions  of  this  in- 
dustry, the  future  was  possibly  for  smaller  rather  than 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       307 

for  larger  farming.  I  remember  the  surprise  of  a 
socialist  scholar  and  writer  who  told  me,  with  some- 
thing like  consternation,  that  he  had  received  trust- 
worthy information  that  the  "  big  farm  "  was  upon 
the  whole  a  failure,  that  the  tide  seemed  to  be  setting 
in  many  districts  in  the  direction  of  more  scientific 
methods  on  small  areas. 

This  news  was  very  disturbing  to  men  who  had 
committed  themselves  with  irrevocable  emphasis  to 
a  proposition  so  open  to  doubt.  An  independent 
investigation  of  their  own  in  Germany  confirmed  the 
case  against  them.  For  years  their  speakers  had 
been  telling  the  peasants  that  their  future  was  hope- 
less. The  campaigners  had  used  big  words  before 
these  agricultural  hearers.  "Evolution"  and  "science" 
were  always  on  their  lips.  It  was  thus  very  chilling 
to  hear  from  this  same  science  that,  as  it  came  to  be 
applied  to  farming,  a  large  part  of  the  cultivators  were 
to  find  new  hope  and  security  in  few  acres  rather 
than  in  many.  Few  social  democrats  were  so  obtuse 
as  not  to  see  that,  at  least  for  this  section  of  the 
farming  class,  it  was  the  last  folly  to  ask  that  their 
holdings  pass  into  a  common  possession.  There 
have  been  ten  years  of  very  bitter  contention  over 
this  agrarian  issue.  The  social  democrats  have  had 
to  pay  the  penalty  which  every  political  party  that 
fights  with  infallible  abstractions  must  pay.  The 
abstraction  in  this  instance  was  at  best  a  poor  sort 
of  half  truth.  When  this  was  discovered,  the  dilemma 
of  the  social  democrats  was  serious.  Their  political 
future  made  it  impossible  to  drop  the  farming  class, 
but  on  what  basis  could  the  propaganda  now  be  carried 
on  ?  They  could  propose  certain  improvements  in  the 


308  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

peasant's  lot,  —  lightened  taxation,  easier  and  safer 
credit,  and  the  like ;  but  to  do  this,  the  social  demo- 
crats must  commit  the  deadly  sin  of  cooperating  with 
agencies  already  in  hand  by  government  and  bourgeois 
associations.  This  compromise  with  existing  society 
had  upon  all  hands  been  pronounced  the  one  disloyalty 
against  their  principles  that  was  never  to  be  pardoned. 
If  one  wished  to  raise  a  riot  in  a  socialist  gathering, 
one  had  only  to  suggest  some  modification  of  doctrines 
that  would  enable  the  party  to  cooperate  with  any 
recognized  state  or  social  policy.  Twenty  years'  ex- 
perience with  the  farmer,  and  the  inquiries  which  this 
agitation  has  involved  have  compelled  a  change  of 
tactics  that  bears  this  party  still  further  from  revo- 
lution toward  the  ordinary  methods  of  an  advanced 
party  politics.  It  is  a  crisis  in  the  history  of  the 
movement,  because  the  fall  of  one  infallible  abstrac- 
tion raises  quick  doubts  about  others.  When  it  was 
once  felt  that  Marx's  thesis  was  more  than  doubtful 
as  regards  agriculture,  the  bolder  minds  began  to  ask 
if  it  was  true  of  other  industries.  The  development 
of  social  politics  under  the  government  (of  which 
workingmen's  insurance  is  a  type)  has  produced  a 
body  of  statistics  about  wages  and  conditions  which 
the  social  democrats  know  they  can  trust.  Many 
questions  can  now  be  tested  for  which  there  was 
neither  proof  nor  disproof  twenty-five  years  ago. 
From  these  and  kindred  sources  of  information,  so- 
cialists now  see  that  the  assertion  that  "the  big 
business  is  growing  bigger  and  the  small  business 
smaller,"  is  not  true,  except  with  qualifications  that 
are  very  vital. 

As  middle-class   incomes   are   increasing,  so   also 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       309 

many  types  of  middle-class  industries  were  never  in 
a  stronger  and  healthier  state  than  at  the  present 
time  in  Germany.  The  proof  of  this,  which  the 
scholarly  Bernstein  has  forced  his  German  comrades 
to  face,  marks  all  the  change  there  is  between  the 
revolutionary  method  of  the  "  class  struggle  "  and  the 
humbler  method  of  social  reform  in  which  all  men  of 
good  will  may  unite.  This  change  marks  an  end  of 
the  man  with  a  formula ;  it  means  a  victory  for  prac- 
tical political  opportunism  in  its  best  sense.  A  single 
line  from  Bernstein's  book  reads  as  if  Mr.  Giffen  or 
Edward  Atkinson  had  written  it,  "  The  number  of  the 
possessing  classes  grows  absolutely  and  relatively."  l 

No  sentence  more  revolutionary  than  this  could 
have  been  written  by  a  socialist  pen.  Nothing  more 
revolutionary  could  happen  than  that  its  significance 
and  its  consequences  should  have  patient  hearing  at 
the  last  Congress.  It  means  no  less  than  a  reversal 
of  political  procedure.  Liebknecht,  in  1893,  says, 
"  Compromise  gives  up  every  principle  for  which  we 
stand."  Four  years  later  he  admits  that  compromise 
has  become  a  necessity  of  party  action.  This  Nestor 
of  the  party  said  at  Hamburg,  "  If  I  can  gain  an 
advantage  from  another  party  by  compromise,  I  will 
seize  it." 

Bebel  also  yields,  and  accepts  what  in  1893  he  had 
hotly  condemned  —  a  working  alliance  with  parlia- 
mentary forces. 

1  The  whole  sentence  is  so  epoch-making  in  the  history  of  socialism 
that  it  should  be  given  in  full :  "  Nicht  mehr  oder  minder,  sondern 
schlechtweg  mehr,  d.  h.  absolut  ««</relativ  wachst  die  Zahl  der  Besit- 
zenden.  Ware  die  Thatigkeit  und  die  Aussichten  der  Sozialdemokratie 
davon  abhangig,  class  die  Zahl  der  Besitzenden  zuruckgeht,  dann  konnte 
sie  sich  in  der  That  '  schlafen  legen.1 " 


310  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

(d)  That  the  wages  of  labor,  as  Lassalle  held,  must 
remain  under  capitalism  on  the  line  of  bare  subsist- 
ence, —  auf  den  nothwendigsten  Lebensunterhalt,  — 
is  likewise  acknowledged  to  be  a  mistake.  It  was 
first  held  to  be  a  "  law  of  nature,"  then  qualified,  and 
finally  in  the  form  first  stated  frankly  given  up. 

(c)  That  the  great  struggle  was  to  be  one  of  clearly 
defined  classes  —  "  proletariat  against  dividend-re- 
ceiver "  —  has  been  fundamental  with  socialists  since 
the  Revolution  of  1848.  It  was  the  alarm  note  with 
which  Marx  and  Engles  opened  their  long  campaign. 
Upon  none  of  the  six  points  just  now  in  view  have  the 
social  democrats  insisted  with  more  untiring  importu- 
nity than  upon  the  fact  that  the  wage-earning  class 
was  separated  in  all  its  interests,  as  by  a  gulf,  from 
its  foe  the  capitalistic  class.  From  the  first  bugle 
note  of  the  International,  "  proletarians  of  all  coun- 
tries unite !  "  down  to  the  obscure  programmes  printed 
at  this  day  in  American  cities,  the  call  is  to  organize 
"  on  class  lines."  For  no  object  have  the  German 
leaders  striven  harder,  than  to  deepen  this  sense  of 
antagonism  among  the  workingmen.  Dr.  Liebknecht, 
to  the  end,  clung  to  his  policy  of  class  strife.  One 
of  his  last  appeals  was  that  the  "class  fight"  be 
maintained,  "the  sharper  the  struggle  the  better  for 
our  party." 

Yet  when  the  veteran  of  the  party  spoke  these 
words  at  Hamburg  in  1897,  n^s  friends  knew  that  the 
lash  fell  upon  a  dead  horse.  From  the  day  when 
the  party  turned  its  back  on  the  absolutism  of  the 
Marx  programme,  and  entered  on  the  way  of  legal 
and  parliamentary  processes,  the  magic  of  the  Klas- 
senkampf  was  gone.  As  long  as  it  was  said,  "We 


FROM  REVOLUTION  TO  REFORM       311 

will  work  with  no  political  party,  —  zu  verwerfen  ist 
jeder  Pakt  mit  einer  andern  Partei,  — we  will  fight  the 
state's  attempt  to  win  us  by  its  workingmen's  insur- 
ance or  by  any  other  palliative,  so  long  was  there  life 
and  meaning  in  the  shibboleth  of  class  antagonism. 
It  is  now  resolved  to  go  to  the  polls  with  any  party 
that  can  give  them  temporary  help.  They  must  give 
and  take.  It  must  in  the  same  spirit  welcome  every 
"  palliative,"  even  if  it  mark  but  an  inch  toward  their 
distant  goal.  All  this  is  now  being  done  by  the  social 
democrats  in  Germany  with  a  heartiness  that  marks 
the  greatest  change  in  the  practice  and  theory  of  the 
movement. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  these  lessons  have  been 
learned  through  the  experience  gathered  in  political 
agitation  of  thirty  years.  Until  the  fall  of  Bismarck, 
the  government  did  all  in  its  power  to  tighten  the 
hold  of  the  social  democrats  upon  every  revolutionary 
conception  they  held.  As  long  as  the  iron  hand  of 
the  chancellor  was  felt  in  drastic  laws  that  made 
socialist  opinion  criminal,  the  counter  policy  was  one 
of  "  Macht  und  Gewalt."  The  first  important  utter- 
ance that  I  have  seen  from  any  socialist,  in  favor  of 
conciliatory  and  parliamentary  measures,  was  after 
these  laws  were  revoked  and  the  present  emperor 
had  admitted  that  the  social  question  was  of  momen- 
tous consequence  and  should  have  every  attention 
that  the  government  could  give  it. 

A  dozen  years  ago,  I  heard  the  bitterest  denuncia- 
tion of  the  state  labor  insurance,  by  socialists  who  now 
defend  it  in  public  speeches.  "  It  is  not  enough," 
they  urge,  "but  all  there  is  of  it  is  good."  Steps  in 
factory  legislation  that  were  once  jeered  at  are  now 


312  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

approved.  Whether  for  the  Reichstag,  Landtag,  or 
the  common  council  of  the  city,  socialists  now  cooper- 
ate, not  alone  in  elections,  but  in  the  general  policy 
of  social  and  industrial  improvement. 

Last  year  in  the  province  of  Brandenburg,  socialist 
municipal  representatives  met  for  deliberation.  It 
perplexes  one  to  find  a  proper  term  of  comparison 
between  the  present  discussion  and  those  that  filled 
the  air  at  such  gatherings  ten  years  ago.  The  ques- 
tions are  now  about  the  introduction  of  direct  employ- 
ment by  the  city,  of  extending  the  franchise,  of  a  better 
tenement-house  bill,  of  the  hours  of  labor,  of  extend- 
ing municipal  control  over  the  street  cars,  etc.  When 
party  tactics  are  chiefly  directed  to  agitation  of  this 
kind,  the  Klassenkampf  in  its  former  sense,  if  not 
quite  dead,  is  no  longer  alive. 

To  have  struck  at  its  roots  this  vicious  growth 
of  the  class  fight  is  the  chief  moral  triumph  in  the 
changes  here  noted.  As  these  sectional  hatreds  are 
overcome,  the  ground  is  first  reached  on  which  the 
longed-for  social  reorganization  can  begin.  The  con- 
ditions that  shall  make  such  reorganization  possible 
can  spring  neither  from  hate  nor  suspicion.  They 
can  come  only  from  a  completer  sense  of  a  common 
and  not  a  divided  social  destiny. 

If  we  look  once  more  at  socialism  in  which  the 
ideals  of  business  and  of  politics  really  unite,  we  shall 
have  the  final  illustration  of  the  collectivist  theory  at 
work  with  results  more  remarkable  still. 

The  German  and  Belgian  experience  offers  society 
its  chance  of  wise  and  generous  cooperation. 


CHAPTER   XI 

SOCIALISM    AT    WORK 

SOCIALISM  in  its  advanced  stage  is  seen  at  its  best 
just  now  in  Belgium.  A  small  country,  sore  pressed 
in  its  industrial  struggle  by  its  great  neighbors,  Eng- 
land, France,  and  Germany,  its  capitalists  have  been 
driven  to  the  closest  cutting  of  the  wage  scale.  They 
have  used  new  mechanical  inventions  to  weaken  the 
trade  union,  in  order  to  employ  women  and  young 
apprentices  more  freely.  Constant  recourse  has  been 
had  to  the  law  against  coalitions  in  the  same  spirit 
that  we  now  use  injunctions.  Especially  among  the 
mining  and  iron  industries,  strikes  were  frequent, 
prolonged,  and  bitter.  Behind  the  formation  of  this 
party  were  the  long,  riotous  strikes  in  that  great  in- 
dustry of  the  country,  coal  mining.  There  were  the 
same  traditional  abuses  that  have  been  the  shame  of 
our  own  coal  region,  —  systematized  pilfering  from 
the  miners  in  the  loading  and  weighing  of  coal, 
in  deductions  by  sale  of  powder  and  through  the 
truck  stores,  and  a  vicious  use  of  credit.  The  final 
result  of  all  this  was  to  throw  these  masses  into  a 
sullen  and  determined  political  opposition.  Social- 
istic organization  began  with  the  appearance  of  the 
International  in  1866.  At  the  first  Congress  in 
Ghent,  1877,  the  Marxian  policy  was  adopted.  There 
was  an  instant  revolt  of  the  autonomists,  or  anar- 


314  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

chist  sections.  There  was  the  same  bitter  internal 
strife  that  everywhere  appears  during  the  period  of 
abstractions. 

Two  years  after  this  first  Congress,  a  movement 
began  which  for  twenty  years  has  added  increasing 
strength  to  the  cause.  In  1879  a  socialist  working- 
man  in  Ghent,  Edouard  Anseele,  angry  at  the  inces- 
sant bickering  over  phrases  and  programmes,  began 
an  experiment  with  a  cooperative  bakery.  In  1898 
I  went  about  this  city  with  M.  Anseele  to  see  the 
stores,  the  bakery,  and  splendid  club-house  with  its 
great  garden.  He  said :  "  The  plan  of  bombarding 
capitalism  with  loaves  of  bread  has  succeeded  beyond 
any  dream  I  ever  had.  I  knew  that  the  wage  system 
was  doomed,  and  that  competition  must  yield  to  coop- 
eration, but  I  did  not  expect  to  see,  while  I  am  still 
young,  six  thousand  loyal  members  in  this  small  city. 
They  tell  us  we  are  atheists  and  without  a  religion ; 
but  without  a  religion  these  poor  families  would  not 
sacrifice  all  they  have  to  build  up  our  cooperative  in 
Ghent.  It  is  our  religion  to  found  a  society  in  which 
the  poor  shall  have  just  as  many  chances  for  leisure, 
good  homes,  and  the  best  education  that  their  talent 
deserves.  We  believe  we  can  do  this  only  by  train- 
ing the  common  people  to  create  more  and  more 
wealth  themselves  without  the  parasites.  We  there- 
fore begin  by  shaking  off  as  many  middlemen  as  we 
can  drive  to  productive  work,  by  doing  better  our- 
selves what  they  did.  We  began  with  bread,  because 
it  is  the  great  necessity  of  us  all.  All  who  buy  our 
bread  are  fighting  the  sweater  who  works  his  laborers 
in  mean  dens  fourteen  and  fifteen  hours.  Every  loaf 
that  we  make  stands  for  a  clean  shop,  three  and 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  315 

four  hours'  less  work  per  day,  and  the  principle  of  the 
minimum  wage.  To  buy  of  us  means  brotherhood 
instead  of  war.  To  make  this  better  method  succeed 
in  the  teeth  of  capitalism  requires  of  our  members 
great  sacrifices  at  the  start.  They  are  making  them 
because  of  their  enthusiasm  for  the  freedom  of  the 
cooperative  state." 

I  went  later  with  M.  Anseele  to  see  the  "  Home  of 
the  People "  —  the  centre  of  social  and  educational 
life.  I  expressed  surprise  that  a  body  of  working- 
men  could  have  bought  a  building  and  grounds  of 
such  pretensions.  "Ah,  but  we  got  it  cheap,"  he 
answered ;  "  it  was  the  club-house  of  the  capitalist 
politicians  (the  liberals).  They  are  now  so  near  a 
wreck  that  they  could  not  afford  to  keep  it.  They 
were  furious  when  they  found  that  their  political 
social  rendezvous  had  become  a  possession  of  the 
socialists." 

The  incident  is  not  without  significance.  It  is  as 
if  the  socialists  in  Chicago  or  New  York  should  buy 
the  Union  League  clubs.  Since  the  founding  of  the 
Parti-Ouvrier,  political  liberalism  with  its  laissez-faire 
traditions  has  so  far  perished  that  all  sorts  of  con- 
servative and  property  interests  have  joined  hands  to 
fight  the  common  foe  —  socialism.  Until  1879  there 
was  obstinate  resistance  by  workingmen  against  all 
proposals  to  take  their  party  into  politics,  just  as  our 
own  farmers'  and  trade-union  organizations  have  so 
often  set  themselves  against  political  affiliations,  but 
may  like  their  Belgian  fellows  be  driven  solidly  into 
politics. 

In  1880,  definite  and  systematized  political  agitation 
began.  I  had  pointed  out  to  me  in  Brussels  the  saloon 


316  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

in  which  the  policy  of  1885  was  framed.  As  English 
trade  unions  in  earlier  days  were  forced  to  meet  in 
drinking  places,  because  no  hall  could  be  hired,  the 
workingmen  here  meet  in  saloons.  My  companion, 
M.  Van  Loo,  actuary  of  the  company,  who  told  me  this, 
was  showing  me  the  veritable  "  Palace  of  the  People," 
just  rising  on  the  heights  and  overlooking  Brussels. 
"  Now,"  he  said,  "  a  strong  party  among  us  is  making 
for  temperance,  and  we  mean  to  put  a  ban  on  all 
gatherings  where  the  passion  for  drink  can  be  used 
to  pay  for  our  meeting  places." 

Trying  once  to  find  the  mayor  in  a  socialist  com- 
mune in  France,  I  was  told  by  a  catholic  gentleman : 
"  The  mayor  ?  Oh,  you  will  find  him  in  the  saloon." 
He  was  in  the  estaminet,  but  the  scornful  comment 
was  not  quite  fair.  Hundreds  of  saloons  are  kept  by 
men  who  have  been  blacklisted  because  they  were  too 
active  in  the  cause  of  labor.  They  became  saloon- 
keepers both  as  a  means  of  sustenance  and  because 
the  agitation  could  in  this  way  be  best  carried  on. 
These  men  were  found  everywhere  in  Belgium.  Sym- 
pathy naturally  led  the  laborers  to  patronize  this  type 
of  drinking  place.  The  principal  organ  of  the  party, 
Le  Peuple,  was  first  printed  in  a  saloon.  A  Brussels 
lawyer  told  me  that  one  great  good  of  the  Maison  du 
Peuple  in  the  different  towns  was  that  the  displaced 
laborer  found  a  natural  home  there.  He  thought  the 
cause  of  temperance  among  the  working  classes  had 
been  distinctly  furthered  by  the  socialist  institutions. 
On  a  fete  day,  one  may  see  hundreds  of  families  in 
and  about  their  clubs,  taking  their  pleasure  far  more 
safely  than  in  private  saloons.  Several  of  the  social- 
ist centres  have  voted  to  exclude  altogether  the  sale 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  317 

of  strong  alcoholic  drinks,  in  spite  of  the  pecuniary 
loss  and  the  driving  away  of  many  comrades.  In  the 
widely  circulated  almanacs  of  the  cooperators  one 
may  find  crisp  and  telling  extracts  upon  the  evils  of 
alcohol.  At  one  of  the  first  sittings  of  the  council 
when  the  Maison  du  Peuple  was  opened  in  Brussels, 
it  was  voted  to  organize  a  campaign  against  the  liquor 
abuse.1 

This  quite  magnificent  building,  which  cost  work- 
ingmen  a  million  francs,  is  to  Brussels  what  the 
"  Vooruit  "  is  to  Ghent  and  "  Progres  "  is  to  Joliment. 
These  are  the  three  leading  centres  of  socialist  work 
and  agitation.  I  went  first  in  Brussels  to  see  the 
great  bakeries,  where  no  employer  or  middleman  has 
any  footing.  In  1897  they  were  producing  in  this 
city  alone  ten  million  kilos  of  bread.  Nearly  one 
hundred  thousand  francs  were,  in  six  months  of  the 
year,  credited  to  the  purchasers  in  benefices.  Five 
thousand  francs  were  set  apart  to  extinguish  the  debt 
on  their  great  club-house,  and  about  thirteen  thou- 
sand for  the  propaganda.  The  membership,  in  1899, 
reached  eighteen  thousand  heads  of  families,  repre- 
senting nearly  one  hundred  thousand  people.  Bread 
was  made  in  such  quantities  that  three  centimes'  re- 
bate per  loaf  gave  back  to  the  buyers  one  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand  francs.  Since  the  beginnings  in 
Ghent  more  than  fourteen  hundred  cooperative  soci- 
eties have  been  established.  These  include  credit 
associations,  creameries,  and  groups  of  farmers  for 
the  common  buying  and  selling.  Many  of  these  are 

1  In  a  collectivist  hall  in  a  mining  district  near  Charleroi,  I  saw  tem- 
perance placards  of  a  kind  that  one  would  expect  to  see  in  a  hall  of  the 
Women's  Christian  Temperance  Union. 


3l8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

purely  business  enterprises,  but  are  greeted  by  collec- 
tivists  as  further  stages  in  the  extinction  of  the  middle- 
man. This  whole  movement  is  economic,  but  at  the 
same  time  political.  The  English  cooperation,  from 
the  store  to  the  wholesale  departments,  thence  to  the 
cooperative  wholesale  workshops,  is  socialistic  in  that 
it  extinguishes  thousands  of  profit-making  middlemen. 
The  business  gains  go  automatically  to  the  sixteen  hun- 
dred thousand  purchasers.  The  Belgian  cooperatives 
are  all  this  and  more.  They  use  their  profits  for  the 
express  purpose  of  spreading  socialism.  Their  thirty- 
three  members  of  parliament,  their  schools  and  lec- 
tures, their  press  and  pamphlet  literature,  make  heavy 
drafts  upon  their  resources.  Literally,  millions  of 
small  pamphlets  have  a  free  distribution  among  work- 
ingmen  not  yet  in  sympathy  with  socialism.  They 
believe  that  capitalism  and  the  wage  system  are  the 
root  and  perpetuation  of  social  inequalities.  They 
believe  that  the  reigning  politics  is  but  a  reflex  of 
these  private  business  interests.  They  therefore  use 
for  their  weapons,  cooperation  and  political  agitation  ; 
the  shareholders  en  masse  hold  the  political  opinions 
of  the  party.  I  asked  a  member  of  parliament  which 
was  considered  the  more  important,  politics  or  busi- 
ness. "  I  cannot  tell,"  he  answered;  "we  go  to  the 
polls  and  the  workshop  for  the  same  end,  to  make 
a  decent  human  society  possible." 

The  economic  and  business  basis  of  this  cult  already 
includes  drug  stores,  creameries,  breweries,  shoe  and 
furniture  making,  groceries,  coal  depots,  and  markets. 
In  addition,  they  now  have  old-age  insurance,  which 
gives  pensions  at  sixty  years  of  age  to  those  who  have 
been  twenty  years  members. 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  319 

At  Ghent  the  doctor  is  free,  as  well  as  medicines 
from  the  socialist  pharmacy.  In  centres  like  Charle- 
roi  and  Joliment  where  the  labor  troubles  have  been 
at  their  worst,  the  growth  of  these  cooperatives  has 
been  rapid.  I  saw  one  at  Roux  in  its  very  beginnings ; 
Four  years  later,  its  property  had  an  official  valuation 
of  above  two  hundred  thousand  francs.  At  Joliment 
the  membership  has  reached  twelve  thousand.  Bak- 
eries, meat  markets,  pharmacies,  were  prosperous;  but 
the  brewery  was  the  source  of  even  more  pride.  Its 
profits  in  1899  were  ten  thousand  francs.  My  guide 
insisted  that  the  brewery  was  even  a  moral  institution ; 
—  "  We  go  much  less  to  the  saloon,  on  boit  cette  excel- 
lente  biere  cooperative  maintenant  en  famille."  The 
enemies  of  this  collectivist  propaganda  tell  you  that 
it  is  coarsely  materialistic,  not  only  destitute  of  reli- 
gion, but  destitute  of  intellectual  and  aesthetic  ideals. 
I  looked  with  some  care  at  their  libraries,  which  rep- 
resent several  thousand  volumes.  These  had  been 
gathered  by  members  whose  daily  wage  does  not,  I 
think,  average  one  dollar  and  a  quarter.  Would  hard- 
working men  and  women,  with  this  income,  pay  for 
such  luxuries  if  lower  motives  alone  moved  them  ? 
There  were  hundreds  of  volumes  which  any  scholar 
would  gladly  possess.  The  selection  was  both  serious 
and  intelligent.  Bibliotltiques  populaires  everywhere 
abound  in  Belgium  and  are  freely  patronized  by  the 
working  class.  As  for  art,  one  of  the  first  sections 
at  the  Maison  du  Peuple,  in  Brussels,  was  founded  in 
order  to  further  aesthetic  interests.  While  I  was  in/ 
Belgium,  two  lectures  were  given  on  the  relation  be- 
tween economics  and  art.  Lectures  were  announced 
on  Wagner  and  William  Morris  and  one  "  On  the 


32O  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

Evolution  of  Art,"  by  one  of  Belgium's  most  eminent 
lawyers,  Senator  Picard. 

A  socialist  character  in  one  of  Henry  James's 
stories  goes  to  Italy.  As  the  great  masters  work 
upon  his  imagination,  the  disturbing  thought  first 
comes  to  him  that  socialism  would  cut  these  noble 
canvases  into  tiny  bits  for  common  distribution. 
This  awful  suggestion  appears  to  bring  him  back  into 
the  beaten  path  of  respectable  opinion.  This  concep- 
tion of  socialist  views  about  art  is  extremely  popular, 
but  it  is  even  more  naively  untrue  than  that  other 
current  philistinism  that  "  socialists  want  to  make 
everybody  equal."  Whether  a  collectivist  society 
would,  as  many  artists  believe,  give  the  world  again  a 
great  art,  cannot  now  be  told,  but  the  effort  to  create 
the  impulse  and  the  conditions  under  which  such  an 
art  would  have  its  inspiration,  is  very  real.  The  most 
important  party  paper,  Le  Peuple,  contains  articles 
upon  aesthetics  from  the  best-known  names  in  Bel- 
gium. It  was  a  socialist  deputy  that  led  the  dis- 
cussion in  Parliament  in  favor  of  a  subsidy  to  restore 
the  Abbaye  d'Aulne.  It  was  this  party  that  urged  the 
ministry  to  have  some  policy  of  making  the  govern- 
ment railroad  stations  beautiful,  from  an  artistic  point 
of  view,  and  to  extend  the  instruction  in  the  museums 
and  art  schools,  so  that  people  should  benefit  more 
freely  from  these  institutions.  Nor  has  any  one  done 
more  in  Belgium  to  extend  what  we  should  call  uni- 
versity extension  than  many  members  of  the  Parti- 
Ouvrier.  These  efforts  to  enrich  the  IT  of  labor, 
together  with  the  attempts  to  lessen  the  evils  of  drink, 
indicate  that  the  term  "  a  coarse  materialism  "  carries 
with  it  more  prejudice  than  truth. 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  321 

Federation  and  its  Hopes 

The  work  of  federating  all  the  socialist  societies  has 
begun.  The  delegates  of  sixty-six  cooperatives  met 
in  Brussels  in  1898.  A  centre  for  registration  was 
established,  and  the  first  wholesale  purchases  for  the 
smaller  groups  have  since  been  made.  Above  one 
hundred  associations  have  already  united  in  this 
federation.  The  workingmen  hope  that  the  eco- 
nomic advantage  of  this  large  organization  —  buying 
and  producing  —  for  the  smaller  societies  will  compel 
outside  cooperators  to  affiliate  with  them.  The  cream- 
eries have  already  federated,  having  in  Brussels  a 
central  market  for  the  sale  of  butter  and  cheese.  The 
Moniteur  Ojficicl  gives  a  list  of  above  four  hundred 
cooperative  societies  founded  from  1898  to  1900. 
The  purely  productive  cooperative  is,  as  everywhere, 
in  the  minority,  but  fifteen  new  ones  are  recorded  in 
the  year  1899. 

The  statement  of  a  socialist  deputy  shows  us  very 
clearly  what  his  party  is  trying  to  do,  and  why  a  bitter 
resistance  comes  now  upon  the  scene.  "We  have," 
he  says,  "proved  once  for  all  that  in  an  increasing 
number  of  industries  the  employer  and  middleman 
can  be  dispensed  with.  Nearly  two  thousand  coopera- 
tives exist  now  in  Belgium.  They  are  upon  the  farm, 
in  the  workshop,  in  hundreds  of  loan  and  credit  as- 
sociations. In  more  than  twenty  different  kinds  of 
businesses,  distributive  and  productive,  cooperation 
has  come  i»  stay.  We  ask  for  freedom  to  extend 
this  method  throughout  the  country.  In  the  fields 
where  cooperation  could  work,  we  can  show  that  three 
millions  of  francs  a  year  can  be  turned  from  the 


322  THE  SOCIAL   UNREST 

pockets  of  useless  middlemen  into  the  pockets  of  all 
the  purchasers  of  these  products.  If  in  any  industry 
we  make  cooperation  a  success,  that  of  itself  proves 
that  the  middleman  was  a  parasite ;  that  he  has  been 
living  upon  the  labor  of  others  and  not  upon  his  own 
producing  power." 

This  outspoken  purpose  together  with  the  steady 
march  of  cooperative  business  has  aroused  the  activity 
of  a  powerful  opposition.  It  is  busy  in  city  councils 
and  with  parliamentary  leaders.  It  is  perhaps  busi- 
est of  all  in  the  catholic  church,  where  a  virulent  hos- 
tility has  developed,  although  it  is  not  primarily 
economic,  but  moral  and  religious.  Many  noble  men 
among  the  priests  agree  with  the  economic  policy  of 
the  socialists,  as  do  many  of  the  Christian  Socialists 
among  the  protestants;  but  religiously  and  morally 
the  catholics  hold  the  socialist  influence  in  abhorrence. 
It  isbelieved  to  subvert  all  organized  worship  and  to  un- 
dermine the  monogamic  family.  A  mass  of  popular 
catholic  literature  is  now  spread  through  the  country 
filled  with  quotations  of  socialist  opinion  on  the 
church  and  on  the  family.  The  immediate  fear  of  the 
church  is  that  socialists  are  turning  the  workingmen 
into  enemies  to  all  religious  authority.  A  catholic 
professor  told  me  that  this  fear  had  a  terrible  justifica- 
tion through  all  the  large  industrial  centres.  To  save 
the  workingmen,  the  catholics  have  also  started,  both 
in  distribution  and  production,  scores  of  cooperative 
associations.  They  have  opened  halls,  reading  rooms, 
and  lecture  courses.  At  their  congresses  upon  the 
social  question,  clubs  of  wage  earners  troop  in  under 
gay  banners,  and  much  of  the  programme  has  to  do 
expressly  with  the  material  interests  of  labor. 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  323 

Another  kind  of  opposition  has  yet  more  interest. 
It  is  the  cry  of  alarm  raised  by  thousands  of  small 
traders.  There  is  here  no  question  of  morals  or 
religion,  but  of  business.  Their  occupation  as  profit 
makers  is  put  in  such  peril  that  a  clamorous  appeal 
goes  up  to  the  political  authorities  to  save  them  from 
the  cooperator.  There  has  even  been  an  International 
Congress  at  Antwerp1  in  the  interests  of  small  traders. 
It  was  under  the  patronage  of  the  Chief  of  the  Cabinet 
and  of  the  Ministers  of  Industry  and  Justice.  To 
this  Congress  the  association  of  business  men  made 
their  appeal.  A  few  lines  from  their  spokesman 
are  worth  reproducing  :  "  It  is  indisputable  that  the 
cooperatives  are  bringing  confusion  into  the  field  of 
the  small  traders.  In  the  districts  where  the  most 
powerful  .of  the  socialist  societies  are  found,  innumer- 
able wagons  carry  bread  to  the  home,  but  carry  also 
other  articles,  like  drugs  and  syrups,  which  are  sold 
below  the  prices  of  other  pharmacies."  It  is  admitted 
in  the  address  that  prices  generally  are  lower  at  the 
socialist  counter.  The  appeal  closes  with  the  request 
that  cooperators  be  allowed  to  sell  only  to  their  own 
members.  If  this  is  granted,  "  la  misere  du  petit 
commerce  serait  moins  grande."  The  fact  that 
private  business  suffered  seems  nowhere  to  be  ques- 
tioned. A  professor  in  the  University  of  Ghent,  Oscar 
Pyfferoen,  closes  a  pamphlet  on  "  The  Small  Busi- 
ness Man  "  with  the  words,  "  The  middle  classes  are 
at  the  present  moment  being  driven  to  the  wall  by 
the  deadly  blows  they  have  received  in  the  struggle." 
Powerful  friends  have  taken  up  the  question  before 

1  A  bulky  report  of  729  pages,  La  Petite  Bourgeoisie,  has  been  pub- 
lished by  Schleppens  in  Brussels,  16  rue  Treuenberg,  1900. 


324  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

government  M.  Gilliaux,  a  deputy  from  Brussels, 
asks  "  if  the  authorities  are  to  stand  idle  while  thou- 
sands of  business  men  are  extinguished."  The  social- 
ists admit  this  to  be  their  purpose,  and  they  are  more- 
over accomplishing  it. 

The  president  of  the  Federation  of  National  Inde- 
pendents, Leon  The"odor,  began  his  speech  in  Parlia- 
ment with  the  words, "  It  is  time  to  act ;  small  merchants 
and  employers  are  menaced  with  destruction,  if  prompt 
and  energetic  remedies  are  not  forthcoming.  From 
an  economic  point  of  view,  their  disappearance  would 
be  an  evil ;  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  nation,  a 
calamity." 

At  Ghent,  a  commission  has  been  taking  evidence 
against  cooperatives  during  1900.  The  charges  are 
humorously  like  the  bill  of  particulars  brought  in  this 
country  against  the  department  stores.  It  is  seen 
that  cooperation  cannot  be  stopped,  but  may  it  not 
be  made  harmless  ?  Cannot  la  petite  bourgeoisie  be 
saved  from  destruction  ?  The  proposals  made  to  the 
government  are  that  distributive  and  productive  socie- 
ties shall  not  be  allowed  to  combine,  that  they  shall 
sell  to  no  one  except  their  own  members,  that  they 
shall  be  prohibited  from  all  political  activities,  that 
no  one  shall  be  hired  from  the  outside  to  fill  any 
administrative  position,  etc.  They  would  have  the 
trade  unions,  as  such,  engage  in  no  commercial  busi- 
ness. The  greatest  of  objections  is  the  intensity  of 
competition  which  the  cooperative  has  raised  against 
"  honest  business." 

As  the  German  government  has  adopted  a  "  Mittel- 
stands  Politik  "  to  strengthen  the  middle  class,  that  it 
may  act  as  a  buffer  against  socialism  and  be  protected 


SOCIALISM   AT  WORK  325 

against  the  Grossindustrie,  so  the  Belgian  government 
now  votes  its  first  subsidy  to  encourage  counter- 
organization  in  the  middle-class  commerce.  A  sec- 
ond congress  was  held  last  year  in  Switzerland  to 
give  an  international  character  to  the  whole  move- 
ment. 

The  government  has  thus  done  what  socialists  long 
since  urged.  When  middle-class  business  raised  its 
first  complaints,  the  socialist  reply  was,  "Associate 
yourselves,  if  you  are  ground  by  the  great  industry 
on  one  side  and  by  our  cooperatives  on  the  other, 
band  together  as  we  have  done,  and  reap  the  same 
advantages." 

This  advice  was  jocose,  as  the  socialists  hold  that 
these  middle-class  associations,  as  they  develop,  will 
be  forced  at  length  to  affiliate  more  and  more  with 
the  cooperatives.  "  They  will  be  forced  to  do  business 
with  us  on  the  cooperative  method,  and  thus  be  edu- 
cated away  from  the  spent  individualism  which  is  now 
their  weakness."  It  is  also  believed  that  middle- 
class  organization  will  offer  an  easier  field  for  propa- 
ganda. When  the  farmers  began  to  learn  the 
advantages  of  cooperation  in  creameries  and  mutual 
credit  associations,  the  socialists  began  a  new  cam- 
paign to  convince  them  that  cooperative  business  was 
fraternal  and  democratic,  and  that  the  meaning  of 
this  was  democracy  in  politics.  The  Brussels  group 
has  bought  a  large  farm,  and  already  counts  one 
farmers'  association  as  a  convert. 

This  brief  history  carries  with  it  a  better  explana- 
tion of  socialism  than  any  formal  proposition  embodied 
in  programmes.  It  is  better  because,  step  by  step,  we 
see  the  theoretic  policy  moulded  and  determined  by 


326  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

its  actual  struggle  to  do  business  in  open  competition 
with  its  enemy,  the  capitalist  employer.  Steadied  by 
these  heavy,  yet  delicate  responsibilities,  the  socialist 
politics  has  been  so  chastened  by  its  fifteen  years' 
experience  that  one  of  the  strongest  men  of  the  party 
told  me  :  "  We  have  learned  that  to  run  the  affairs  of 
a  town  or  of  the  government  is  immensely  more  diffi- 
cult than  any  of  us  supposed.  If  we  had  the  chance 
to  assume  government  responsibility,  we  should  refuse 
it,  because  we  are  not  yet  ready  for  it." 

Even  the  more  ideal  expression  of  what  they  hope 
to  bring  about  is  now  stated  in  different  language.  A 
noble  scholar,  Hector  Denis,  who  has  dedicated  his 
life  to  this  party,  and  is  now  socialist  member  from 
Liege,  gives  an  invaluable  statement  of  the  changes 
observable  in  the  hopes  and  purposes  of  the  party. 
The  period  dominated  by  Robert  Owen's  influence, 
he  calls  that  of  1'altruisme  id^aliste.  Its  disinterested 
devotion  was  heroic,  but  men  and  women  were  asked 
to  respond  by  qualities  that  were  not  yet  developed  in 
them.  The  greed  and  jealousies,  created  by  ages  of 
competitive  conflict,  were  too  slightly  modified  to  meet 
Owen's  feverish  expectations.  His  hope  that  men 
would  work  for  a  common  capital  as  faithfully  as  for 
private  gains,  was  generous  but  unwise. 

The  reaction  comes  with  the  Rochdale  pioneers  of 
1844.  The  cooperative  ideal  remains,  but  the  self- 
regarding  instincts  are  not  lost  sight  of.  The  in- 
crement of  gain  goes  no  longer  to  a  middleman,  neither 
does  it  go  communistically  into  a  general  fund,  but 
very  definitely  to  individual  purchasers.  The  heavy 
race  egotism  has  to  be  long  disciplined  by  this  form  of 
cooperation.  We  may  still  be  cheered  by  that  far- 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  327 

off  ideal  in  which  "  all  for  each  and  each  for  all"  shall 
have,  even  in  the  processes  of  the  world's  wealth  get- 
ting, a  higher  fulfilment. 

This  truce  of  the  idealist,  with  the  stubborn  reali- 
ties of  human  nature,  appears  throughout  this  Belgian 
movement  in  ways  so  significant  that  they  furnish,  I 
believe,  the  most  luminous  hints  that  modern  social- 
ism anywhere  offers. 

Though  far  younger  than  the  German  party,  this 
Belgian  contingent  began  by  stating  its  economic 
programme,  with  that  doctrinaire  exactness  which  is 
easy  where  there  has  been  no  experience.  There 
is  no  difficulty  in  writing  unanimous  and  sounding 
resolutions  that  "the  laborer  shall  have  the  whole 
product,"  that  "none  should  work  longer  than  eight 
hours,"  that  "work  by  the  day  should  replace  piece 
work,"  that  "the  taking  of  interest  is  theft,"  that 
"  all  should  be  paid  according  to  their  needs."  Such 
opinions  were  religiously  held  by  thousands  of  Belgian 
collectivists  less  than  twenty  years  ago.  They  are  the 
current  formulas  of  propaganda  until  they  undergo 
the  tests  of  practical  experiment.  These  experiments 
have  been  made  in  Belgium.  They  have  been  made 
long  enough  and  in  such  variety,  that  the  results  can- 
not be  mistaken. 

In  1898  I  visited  a  large  number  of  businesses  car- 
ried on  by  workingmen  socialists;  bakeries,  pharmacies, 
breweries,  clothing  and  furniture  and  boot  making,  to- 
gether with  many  distributive  stores.  I  had  learned 
from  socialist  statements  that  a  few  years  of  hard 
work  in  the  drudgery  of  managing  men  and  women 
workers,  so  well  as  to  make  the  business  succeed,  had 
refashioned  several  articles  of  the  creed.  I  will  give 


328  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

as  faithfully  as  I  can  report  them,  the  reasons  that 
the  socialist  managers  and  members  assigned  for  these 
compromises,  (a)  I  had  been  to  a  private  bakery  to 
see  if  machinery  of  later  and  better  type  was  there  used 
than  in  the  socialist  bakeries.  I  found  in  this  in- 
stance that  the  socialists  had  the  newer  and  more  per- 
fect machines.  I  asked  the  manager  if  the  men  did 
not  object  to  these  inventions  because  they  would 
displace  labor.  "  Yes,"  he  answered,  "  we  had  to  fight 
that  out,  but  it  never  caused  us  much  trouble,  because 
it  was  easy  to  show  that  if  we  own  the  machines,  the 
better  they  are,  the  better  it  is  for  us."  But  do  they 
not  as  a  fact  displace  the  men  ?  I  urged.  "  Yes,  of 
course,  but  they  make  more  work  somewhere  else 
which  some  of  our  men  must  do.  Besides,  we  know  that 
the  more  bread  we  can  turn  out  with  the  best  machin- 
ery, the  better  wages  we  can  pay  and  the  shorter  hours 
we  can  give."  It  was,  of  course,  never  held  by 
any  sane  socialists  that  machinery  was  other  than 
good  if  owned  by  the  community ;  but  here  these  men, 
out  of  a  very  brief  experience,  had  learned  all  that  any 
economist  or  business  man  could  teach  them  as  to  the 
reasons  why  machinery  is  good.  They  had,  moreover, 
learned  one  lesson,  about  which  the  bourgeois  world 
is  still  in  a  very  muddled  state ;  namely,  that  in  those 
instances  in  which  new  machinery  really  displaces 
men  at  such  time  of  life  as  to  leave  them  in  want,  the 
plainest  duties  were  left  undone,  until  work  was  found 
or  some  form  of  insurance  had  brought  relief.  This 
was  one  of  the  reasons  for  the  insurance  system  of 
theVooruit  in  Ghent.  They  had  rationally  connected 
cause  and  event,  building  up  a  system  of  "benefits," 
under  which  some  clear  conception  of  social  justice 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  329 

was  realized.  The  injured  or  the  aged  had  his  burden 
lightened  by  a  systematized  and  logical  plan.  The 
family  is  not  helped  as  a  matter  of  charity,  but  as  a 
conceded  right. 

(£)  I  next  found  women  working  ten  hours  and  men 
hard  by,  nine  hours.  In  my  collectivist  catechism,  I 
pointed  to  the  opinion  that  eight  hours  should  be  the 
maximum  for  all ;  that  five  or  six  would  probably 
suffice.  "  Yes,"  he  said,  "  we  have  been  disappointed ; 
we  thought  that  we  could  make  that  rule  universal,  but 
it  would  not  work.  A  great  deal  of  our  business  can 
be  managed  with  eight  hours,  and  sometime  we  shall 
do  all  of  it  so ;  but  at  present,  much  of  the  simpler 
work  would  lose  so  heavily  under  eight  hours  that 
we  could  not  carry  it  on.  We  shall  push  on  toward 
shorter  hours  just  as  fast  as  conditions  will  allow." 
I  asked  if  a  compulsory  eight-hour  law  would  help. 
"  No,"  he  replied,  "  not  for  the  kind  of  work  in  which 
we  have  found  that  nine  and  ten  hours  will  produce 
more  than  eight.  If  France,  England,  and  Germany 
could  be  held  to  eight  hours  in  these  special  indus- 
tries, we  could  stand  it ;  but  that  is  not  yet  possible. 
We  have  got  to  work  it  out  ourselves  and  lower  the 
time  by  continual  tests,  to  see  where  we  can  do  it 
without  loss."  The  entire  literature  of  the  eight- 
hour  movement  has  not  developed  one  line  beyond 
the  good  sense  of  this  socialist  workingman  who  was 
receiving,  when  I  saw  him,  one  dollar  and  twenty 
cents  a  day. 

(V)  Closely  analogous  to  this,  are  the  altered  con- 
ceptions about  the  minimum  wage  and  piece-work. 
It  was  fundamental  that  all  workers  in  the  collectivist 
regime  should  be  paid  the  minimum  wage,  —  a  sura 


330  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

below  which  the  daily  earnings  should  not  fall.  This 
principle  still  holds,  but  modified  so  ingeniously  as  to 
increase  our  respect  for  their  practical  intelligence. 
When  it  was  found  that  the  sewing  girls  in  Ghent 
often  produced  so  little,  that  the  minimum  wage 
took  all  the  profit  or  even  left  a  loss,  it  was  decided 
and  rigidly  enforced  that  a  minimum  product  should 
be  a  condition  of  the  minimum  wage,  i.e.  work 
enough  should  first  be  done  before  this  wage  prin- 
ciple should  be  applied.  My  first  amazement  at  this 
tribute  to  common  industrial  experience  gave  place 
to  admiration  when  the  reasons  appeared.  "  We  could 
not,"  it  was  said,  "  allow  a  given  wage  in  all  kinds  of 
work  and  with  all  sorts  of  workmen.  Some  will 
trifle,  gossip,  waste  their  own  time  and  that  of  others. 
Some  men  care  more  for  the  saloon,  and  some  girls 
more  for  flirting  and  prinking  than  for  their  work. 
We  are  still  too  imperfect  to  apply  such  a  rule  without 
modification  and  exceptions."  Ingenuity  in  manag- 
ing the  doctrine  reached  its  climax  as  he  added, 
"  Mais  vous  savez  qu'il  faut  exiger  un  minimum  de 
production  puisqu'il  y  aura  un  minimum  de  besoins 
a  satisfaire,"  —  we  must  require  a  minimum  product 
because  they  all  have  a  minimum  of  wants  to  be 
satisfied.  Was  ever  more  admirable  agility  shown 
in  doing  effectively  what  had  to  be  done,  and  then 
furnishing  a  theory  for  it  ?  The  three  Massachusetts 
towns  in  which  I  have  seen  the  minimum  wage  ap- 
plied to  laborers,  were  sorry  bunglers  compared  to 
these  workingmen  of  Ghent.  One  of  these  said  to  me, 
"  I  think  it  very  likely  that  men  will  always  have  to  do 
a  given  stint  of  work  before  they  can  be  given  any 
set  reward."  This  is  evidently  near  akin  to  piece- 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  331 

work.  Collectivists,  as  well  as  many  trade  unions,  have 
long  and  obstinately  objected  to  working  by  the  piece, 
because  it  is  a  method  by  which  the  employer  can  set 
a  too  rapid  pace  for  the  whole  group  of  laborers. 

Time-work  was  given  a  thorough  trial  in  Ghent  and 
elsewhere.  A  great  deal  of  the  cooperative  work 
can  be  done  by  those  receiving  day  wages,  but  much 
of  it  cannot  be  so  done  for  reasons  that  are  as  old  as 
the  history  of  human  toil.  The  loafer  will  shirk  his 
responsibility  under  a  time  wage.  Pointing  to  work- 
ers of  both  sexes  in  a  shoeshop,  my  informant  said : 
"  Many  here  could  be  paid  by  the  day  and  would  not 
shirk,  but  many  of  them  have  been  tried,  and  will  not 
earn  what  is  paid  them.  That  young  fellow  worked 
here  for  months  for  four  francs  a  day;  when  his  prod- 
uct was  measured,  I  found  that  he  had  earned  much 
less  than  this.  He  was  then  put  on  piece-work,  in 
company  with  others,  when  it  soon  appeared  that  he 
was  doing  from  a  third  to  twice  as  much  work,  with- 
out any  injury  to  him."  These  tests  (with  the  same 
results)  are  the  commonest  experience  throughout 
ordinary  industry.  The  collectivists,  once  seriously  at 
work,  learn  quickly  what  the  race  has  learned,  and 
learn  moreover  to  defend  their  practice  by  the  same 
reasons  that  any  private  manufacturer  would  give. 
The  dead  beat  is  indeed  more  objectionable  in  a  coop- 
erative, because  all  see  that  his  sloth  or  shabby  work 
hurts  every  member  of  the  group.  An  article  in  Le 
Peuple  gives  this  reason,  as  it  urges  a  careful  consid- 
eration of  the  best  methods  of  wage  payment,  —  s'il 
ne  serait  pas  possible  de  perfectionner  les  modes  de 
remuneration  usitdes  dans  les  cooperatives. 

Once  familiar  with  these  facts,  it  brought  no  sur- 


332  THE   SOCIAL  UNREST 

prise  to  find  in  the  same  workshop  an  elastic  scale 
of  wages.  Whether  by  the  day  or  by  the  piece,  the 
variations  were  as  great  as  would  be  found  in  some 
private  factories.  In  a  small  shop,  filled  with  sewing 
girls,  one  small  group  was  paid  by  the  piece  at  a  rate 
that  could  not  have  given  more  than  two  francs  a  day. 
When  I  asked  about  this,  it  was  said,  "  Those  shirts  sell 
on  the  market  as  low  as  forty  cents,  so  we  can't  pay 
very  much."  The  great  lesson  that  wages  are  condi- 
tioned by  the  amount  of  product  and  by  competitive 
prices  on  the  market,  had  been  thoroughly  learned. 
Price  lists  were  studied  in  the  central  office,  and  the 
amount  of  foreign  competition  carefully  estimated. 

The  impression  deepened  upon  the  visitor,  that 
these  men  had  learned  the  limitations  under  which 
practical  business  is  done  as  thoroughly  as  those 
bred  in  the  outside  world.  They  maintain  earnestly 
that  the  socialistic  principle,  under  which  the  laborer 
is  to  have  the  total  product,  is  in  no  way  violated. 
"  Our  one  aim  is  to  make  wages  just  as  near  the  sell- 
ing value  of  the  product  as  possible.  They  can't,  of 
course,  have  all  they  make,  because  of  so  many  inci- 
dental expenses.  We  have  interest  charges,  rent,  and 
our  managers  to  pay."  He  admitted  that  all  collec- 
tivists  were  against  interest  and  rent,  but  pleaded 
very  sanely  in  excuse  that  they  must  have  capital  to 
buy  machinery,  horses,  wagons,  etc.  "  Men  won't  let 
us  have  their  money  without  interest,"  he  said ;  "  we 
must,  too,  have  land  and  buildings,  and  owners  must 
be  paid  for  these  as  they  are  paid  for  their  capital." 
He  told  me  they  even  borrowed  money  at  current 
rates  from  their  own  members.  Sometime,  he  added, 
the  community  will  own  all  this  machinery  and  capi- 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  333 

tal,  and  then  rent  and  interest  will  be  at  an  end. 
Then  we  shall  sell  our  products  as  close  to  cost  as 
possible  and  profits,  too,  will  disappear. 

Here  was  the  doctrinaire  socialist,  but  in  his  most 
harmless  form.  He  saw  as  well  as  another  why  in- 
terest and  rent  were  at  present  necessary  and  must 
long  remain  so.  He  and  his  fellows  had  learned  this 
in  the  only  way  in  which  the  race  ever  learns  any- 
thing, by  exercising  those  industrial  functions  out  of 
which  interest  and  rent  naturally  arise.  In  their  fort- 
nightly discussions  at  the  Maison  du  Peuple  all  these 
things  were  from  time  to  time  discussed.  In  no 
assembly  does  a  mere  theorist  have  so  hard  a  time. 
They  are  doing  the  kind  of  work  which  furnishes  all 
the  reasons  that  are  needed  for  the  argument.  The 
members  that  loan  their  own  savings  to  the  coopera- 
tive know  why  they  take  interest.  They  all  know 
from  day  to  day  the  difficulties  that  arise ;  why  one 
set  of  workers  can  work  in  three  shifts  of  eight  hours 
each ;  why  another  set  must  work  nine  hours,  and 
another  nine  and  a  half ;  why  three  and  a  half  francs 
is  as  just  for  one  man  as  seven  francs  a  day  for 
another.  It  is  with  this  sure  knowledge  susceptible 
of  tests  in  every  shop  that  the  cranks  are  subdued. 
They  have  the  same  proportion  of  them  as  society  in 
general,  and  they  can  manage  them  much  better. 

Another  fascinating  subtlety  in  socialist  discussion 
has  been  that  which  concerns  the  extra  payment  of 
ability.  There  is  no  commoner  charge  against  the 
further  democratized  administration  of  business  than 
that  it  would  not  pay  for  the  talent  requisite  to  suc- 
cess. Can  common  laborers  ever  be  made  to  under- 
stand that  the  ability  to  organize  and  direct  a  great 


334  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

business  must  be  paid  enormous  salaries?  Is  not 
capacity  to  direct,  to  buy,  and  to  sell  in  great  quanti- 
ties as  rare  and  as  precious  as  genius  ?  Is  not  labor 
the  beast,  as  Mr.  Mallock  assures  us,  and  the  em- 
ployer the  man  upon  his  back?  What  horse  can 
fitly  estimate  the  reward  due  to  its  rider  ?  There  is 
doubtless  much  hard  truth  in  this  objection  to  a  more 
democratic  ordering  of  business,  but  even  less  doubt 
is  there  that  the  argument  in  favor  of  huge  salaries 
has  been  a  good  deal  overworked.  I  have  heard  one 
of  the  ablest  insurance  men  in  the  country  admit  that 
it  had  been  ridiculously  overvalued  in  his  own  busi- 
ness. "  There  has  been,"  he  said,  "  a  world  of 
favoritism  in  these  great  salaries."  Germany,  Aus- 
tria, New  Zealand,  manage  different  forms  of  in- 
surance on  a  very  large  scale,  but  do  not  find  it 
necessary  to  pay  salaries  that  remind  us  in  the 
least  of  many  paid  in  the  United  States. 

It  was  long  said  that  English  cooperation  would 
fail,  except  within  very  narrow  limits,  because  the 
ordinary  members  would  never  consent  to  pay  really 
strong  men  as  managers.  This  has  proved  to  be 
one  of  the  least  of  its  difficulties.  I  once  asked  a 
man  who  is  at  the  head  of  a  business,  whose  transac- 
tions represent  more  than  thirty  millions  of  dollars 
a  year,  if  managers  could  be  found  (in  case  of  his 
death)  at  a  salary  of  three  or  four  thousand  dollars  a 
year.  "  That  bugbear  does  not  trouble  us  any  more," 
he  answered.  "We  train  them  within  the  coopera- 
tive ranks  as  fast  as  we  can  use  them.  I  have  five 
men  near  me  now,  any  one  of  whom  is  as  capable  as 
I  am."  This  illustration  is  necessary  because  the 
socialist  answer  loses  its  force  unless  the  educational 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  335 

scheme  is  kept  in  mind.  He  knows  that  as  long  as 
the  masses  are  ignorant,  they  will  set  slight  value  on 
mental  gifts.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  so  much  prom- 
inence is  given,  in  many  of  the  socialist  platforms, 
to  compulsory  education  of  a  far  more  comprehensive 
character  than  now  exists.  They  are  incontestably 
right  in  asking  that  during  the  entire  formative 
period  of  growth  all  children  should  be  kept  at  school. 
Let  these  schools  be  enriched  by  the  best  that  manual 
art  and  industrial  training  can  offer,  then  the  appre- 
ciation of  ability  will  be  assured.  It  is  one  of  the 
reasons  why  the  collectivist  brotherhood,  the  world 
over,  is  so  at  one  against  the  desolating  waste  of 
militarism  in  all  its  forms.  It  would  use  these  thou- 
sands of  millions  yearly  to  train  citizens.  To  the 
children  of  the  poorer  classes  it  would  give  an 
education  as  complete  and  thorough  as  that  which  the 
rich  can  command.  Collectivists  urge  that  a  genera- 
tion, in  which  every  boy  and  girl  is  trained  to  the 
verge  of  manhood  and  womanhood,  will  know  ability 
and  value  it  after  its  qualities. 

These  are  their  hopes ;  meanwhile  the  great  mem- 
bership in  the  cooperatives  is  now  learning  to  dis- 
tinguish very  sharply  between  the  dolt  and  the  man 
of  gifts.  I  asked  in  Brussels,  why  a  certain  man 
was  paid  a  little  more  than  five  times  as  much  as  the 
lowest  laborer.  "  Because  he  is  worth  it,"  was  the 
reply.  "  As  our  works  enlarge,  we  shall  have  to  pay 
still  higher  salaries.  The  great  rewards  of  the  com- 
petitive business  we  shall  not  pay,  because  other 
motives  will  enable  us  to  secure  first-rate  capacity, 
just  as  the  manager  of  the  Vooruit  gives  us  his  best 
strength,  but  has  never  received  twelve  hundred 


336  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

dollars  a  year.  He  has  been  asked  many  times  to 
take  charge  of  private  concerns  for  a  high  salary,  but 
he  is  not  even  tempted.  He  is  in  parliament,  he  has 
great  influence,  his  leadership  is  recognized,  and  these 
things  are  more  to  him  than  to  imitate  the  bourgeois. 
The  greatest  service  we  are  doing  is  to  educate 
many  men  just  like  him." 

I  once  asked  the  English  cooperator,  Mitchell, 
why  he  gave  his  services  as  manager  for  so  small  a 
salary.  I  had  been  told  that  he  had  many  times 
been  offered  much  higher  compensation.  He  re- 
plied :  "  I  think  I  have  the  respect  of  my  Rochdale 
cooperators.  I  have  a  good  deal  of  power,  I  have 
great  faith  in  the  cooperative  ideal,  and  these  things 
satisfy  me."  This  is  the  contention  of  the  collectivist, 
that  when  business  is  done  from  a  deeper  sense  of 
common  interests  —  tous  pour  un  et  un  pour  tous  — 
other  than  purely  money  motives  will  move  strong 
men  to  work  hard  in  business  for  far  smaller  rewards, 
precisely  as  they  now  so  work  in  science,  in  art,  in 
armies,  and  in  the  best  of  our  politics. 

That  these  Belgian  workingmen  so  quickly  learned 
that  the  rarer  gifts  should  be  more  amply  recom- 
pensed and  could  give  rational  grounds  why  this  is 
done,  indicates  that  further  difficulties  of  the  kind 
that  may  arise  in  the  future  will  be  met  with  the 
same  practical  wisdom. 

Thus,  what  have  been  thought  by  individualistic 
critics  to  be  the  craziest  notions  in  the  collectivist 
programmes,  are  found  to  be  tempered  to  moderation 
by  some  fifteen  years  of  continuous  routine  work  in 
bearing  common  business  burdens.  It  has  been 
learned  that  the  methods  of  remuneration,  hours  of 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  337 

labor,  piece-work,  the  uses  of  interest  and  rent  and 
extra  compensation  of  ability,  are  facts  to  be  dealt 
with  in  the  same  practical  spirit  as  they  are  dealt 
with  under  the  old  wage  system.  When  I  said  to  a 
manager  in  Charleroi,  "  Except  that  you  get  rid  of 
middlemen  and  thoroughly  democratize  your  busi- 
ness, your  actual  work  is  done  much  as  it  is  done 
elsewhere."  —  "  Yes,"  he  said,  "  only  we  make  it  plain 
that  all  forms  of  rent  and  undertaker's  profit  are  like 
so  many  weights  hung  about  the  neck  of  labor. 
We  are  to  get  rid  of  them  as  fast  as  we  can  throw 
them  off.  The  capitalists  propose  to  keep  them  and 
get  up  all  sorts  of  reasons  to  show  that  they  are  a 
blessing.  Our  method  of  association  has  already 
proved  that  thousands  of  profit  makers  are  unneces- 
sary. We  prove  it,  because  we  serve  the  consumer 
better  without  the  middlemen,  and  thus  force  him 
to  produce  things  instead  of  living  by  cutting  off  an 
unnecessary  profit.  We  mean  to  carry  this  work  on 
until  all  the  workers  are  so  well  educated  that  they 
can  do  business  together,  with  their  own  machinery 
and  capital,  producing  things  and  distributing  them 
as  nearly  at  cost  as  we  can,  and  lowering  the  hours 
as  far  as  we  are  able  to."  To  my  suggestion  that 
this  was  not  a  very  revolutionary  programme,  he 
replied,  "  When  we  talk  about  revolution,  all  we  mean 
is  evolution  hurried  up." 

When  large  bodies  of  workingmen  are  educated 
to  the  point  that  they  are  willing  to  pit  their  work- 
ing methods  openly  and  fearlessly  against  competitive 
industry,  asking  only  that  the  trial  be  a  fair  one,  I 
submit  that  no  more  conservative  and  hopeful  influ- 
ence could  be  introduced  into  modern  society.  Not 


338  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

a  single  cooperative  centre  has  been  made  a  success 
without  disciplining  the  members  into  a  spirit  of  cau- 
tion and  prudence  in  the  application  of  business 
principles.  Every  added  business  burden  will  in- 
crease the  care  and  responsibility  that  steadies  their 
politics,  as  it  steadies  their  industrial  management. 
The  aim  of  socialist  politics  is  invariably  to  transform 
industry.  But  this  politics  will  never  be  freed  from 
the  delirium  and  the  dangers  of  unreal  hopes  and 
tipsy  schemes,  until  it  is  disciplined  by  the  weight  of 
business  duties  and  obligations.  Political  duties  alone 
have  precious  lessons  for  the  German  social  democ- 
racy. Belgian  collectivists  are  learning  both  together. 
They  have  added  to  their  obligations  in  politics  the 
severe  accountabilities  of  industrial  management. 

As  the  story  of  this  hard  won  experience  has 
lengthened;  as  it  has  been  repeated  and  discussed 
in  every  detail  among  the  workers  for  a  dozen  years, 
another  change  has  taken  place  :  the  statement  of 
principles  grows  painstaking  and  judicious.  It  is 
admitted  that  the  great  questions  are  more  complex 
and  difficult  than  had  been  supposed.  The  bumptious 
and  cocksure  tone  is  tempered  by  wholesome  doubts. 
Big  and  sanguine  generalizations  do  not  pass  without 
challenge.  Within  the  very  camp  of  the  socialists 
arises  a  new  criticism  of  almost  every  sonorous  affir- 
mation upon  which  the  older  collectivism  was  built. 
For  example,  the  state  was  "  to  absorb  all  means  of 
production."  One  may  now  hear  this  chaffed  at  by 
the  most  loyal  members  of  the  party.  It  is  seen  that 
innumerable  lesser  forms  of  machinery  may  be  left 
to  private  ownership.  The  straight  logic  of  collec- 
tivism would  permit  no  woman  to  own  her  loom, 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  339 

if  she  made  upon  it  articles  for  sale.  The  same 
logic  would  cry  thief  to  the  petty  landowner  if 
he  sent  his  vegetables  to  market.  All  private  ap- 
propriation of  land  and  machinery  for  profit-mak- 
ing purposes,  is  high  crime  before  the  severe  con- 
sistencies of  this  theory.  The  small  sponger  may 
be  less  harmful  than  the  great  one,  but  he  is  a 
sponger  still.  The  socialist  humor  has  begun  to 
work  freely  upon  this  subject.  I  have  been  told: 
"  We  do  not  wish  to  make  the  theory  ridiculous  by 
forcing  it  to  its  last  consequences.  We  shall  not  dis- 
turb the  small  man  in  la  petite  Industrie,  whether  on 
the  land  or  in  the  little  shop.  It  is  the  great  industry 
that  we  attack."  This  position  has,  moreover,  even 
in  the  collectivist  doctrine,  this  justification  :  many 
of  the  ablest  writers  have  held  that  only  when  the 
great  industry  has  driven  the  small  industry  to  the 
wall  has  the  time  for  socialist  action  arrived. 

With  this  qualification  the  strongest  exponents  of 
Belgian  collectivism  still  maintain  the  integrity  of 
their  theory.  Therefore,  the  plot  of  ground,  the 
small  shop  and  mill  with  a  few  helpers,  may  be  left 
in  private  possession  until  they  are  brought  to  ruin 
by  their  great  competitors.1 

The  most  vigorous  exponent  of  this  party,  M.  Vander- 
velde,  objects  to  Dr.  Schaffle's  famous  definition,  "  the 
collective  appropriation  of  all  the  means  of  production 
and  circulation."  "  We  do  not,"  says  this  writer,  "  want 
all  the  means  of  production,  but  the  great  and  leading 
industries."  He  admits  that  collectivism  is  but  partial 
until  the  small  employers  also  disappear.  But  mean- 

1  See  "  Le  Socialisme  en  Belgique,"  pp.  259,  261,  by  Destree  et 
Vandervelde. 


34O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

while  the  lesser  industries  are  to  be  left  free  to  develop 
as  they  will. 

The  practical  consequences  of  this  attitude  are  as 
noteworthy  for  this  party  as  they  are  for  society  in 
general.  Socialist  writers  before  audiences  and  in 
their  printed  appeals  will  still  protest  solemnly  and 
indignantly  that  these  changes  are  free  from  incon- 
sistencies and  of  slight  significance.  My  reply  to 
this  is  that  the  man  who  made  these  qualifications 
and  obvious  compromises  a  dozen  years  ago,  was  in 
every  continental  country  pronounced  a  renegade. 
Long  after  English  Fabians  had  settled  to  the  hum- 
bler tasks  of  political  and  industrial  opportunism,  it 
was  common  to  hear  continental  socialists  speak  of  the 
Fabians  as  a  group  of  bourgeois  imitators  that  would 
only  bring  disgrace  upon  the  cause  by  betraying  its 
fundamental  principles.  When  the  Belgian  coopera- 
tives began  to  develop  so  far  as  to  hold  the  collec- 
tivist  politics  in  some  restraint,  many  of  the  brother- 
hood in  France  classed  them  contemptuously  with 
the  Fabians,  as  "  mere  reformers." 

Those  who  believed  in  a  flawless  economic  dogma, 
and  in  revolutionary  and  heroic  remedies,  were  right 
to  count  these  reformers  as  enemies.  From  the 
moment  the  ways  of  practical  compromise  were 
opened,  every  step  has  led  to  affiliation  with  the 
ordinary  methods  of  social  improvement.  The  full 
force  and  significance  of  this  show  at  once  in  the 
practical  growth  of  the  cooperative.  In  the  country 
it  must  have  capital  and  therefore  a  system  of  saving. 
The  pest  of  the  Jewish  usurer  is  the  first  obstacle  to 
overcome.  One  weapon  against  the  usurer  has  proved 
so  effective  that  no  practical  man  can  ignore  it  —  the 


SOCIALISM   AT  WORK  341 

Reiffeisen  Bank  or  some  form  of  Mutual  Credit  Asso- 
ciation. Instead  of  the  usurer's  twelve  to  fifteen  per 
cent,  four  and  five  per  cent,  on  better  and  easier  terms, 
may  be  secured.  Therefore  the  collectivists  adopt 
these  agencies,  the  very  purpose  of  which  is  to  widen 
and  strengthen  private  property  in  the  very  forms 
that  socialism  has  pronounced  parasitic.  In  the  last 
statement  I  have  received,  which  records  the  works 
and  purposes  of  the  party,  the  socialists  are  urged 
to  make  all  possible  use  of  Reiffeisen  credit  banks. 
There  is  even  praise  of  the  catholic  Abb6  Mellaerts 
who  introduced  them  into  Belgium.  These  banks, 
says  the  socialist  depute^  from  Liege,  "  rendent  de  r^els 
services  "  —  "  don't  go  to  the  great  banks,  but  save 
your  own  money.  Lend  and  borrow  for  four  per  cent, 
and  win  for  yourselves  economic  independence."  1 

1  The  contrast  between  the  sobriety  of  the  Belgian  socialism  that 
has  had  fifteen  years'  business  experience  and  the  socialism  in  the 
neighboring  French  towns  is  full  of  lessons. 

The  red  flag  is  a  sacred  symbol,  and  one  of  the  most  popular  gayeties 
is  to  insult  the  national  emblem  —  le  drapeau  tricolore. 

Citizen  Donnoy  is  applauded  when  he  points  to  the  national  flag  at 
the  Congress  at  Montlu?on  and  says,  "  Sous  les  plis  duquel  le  bour- 
geois a  commis  toutes  les  trahisons  envers  la  patrie." 

This  is  the  grim  and  bitter  emphasis  which  is  still  put  upon  the 
determined  apartness  of  the  class  struggle.  One  form  which  this 
tenacious  illusion  takes  is  the  uproarious  approval  of  the  "  universal 
strike."  At  every  congress  since  that  at  Calais,  1890,  to  that  at 
Rennes,  in  1898,  this  tumultuous  resolution  is  passed,  "  Let  the  world's 
workers  lay  down  their  tools;  let  the  millions  in  every  land  who  pro- 
duce the  wealth  stop  all  toil,  and  the  infamous  parasite  of  capital  will 
soon  capitulate."  Some  talk  like  this  is  still  tolerated  among  the 
Belgian  collectivists,  but  the  comrades  who  guide  the  movement  have 
learned  that  it  is  nonsense.  They  have  come  to  know  first,  that  the 
workers  will  not  unite  in  any  such  insane  escapade,  and  second,  that 
if  they  did,  it  would  work  chiefly  to  their  own  undoing. 


342  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

For  dramatic  interest  there  is  even  a  more  startling 
recommendation.  If  the  great  Lassalle  had  one 
enemy  upon  whom  he  poured  more  scorn  than  upon 
any  other,  that  man  was  Schultze-Delitzsch.  All  that 
was  scathing  and  venomous  in  the  German  tongue 
was  showered  upon  this  founder  of  credit  banks  for 
town  populations.  They  were  to  serve  the  small 
needs  in  the  town  as  Reiff eisen  met  them  in  the  coun- 
try. What  would  this  high  priest  of  socialism  have 
said,  to  find  in  authoritative  socialist  sources,  a  single 
generation  after  his  death,  a  cordial  recommendation 
of  Schultze-Delitzsch's  banking  scheme  ?  To  Las- 
salle, every  use  that  the  workingman  made  of  these 
credit  banks  "  added  a  link  to  the  chain  that  bound 
him."  The  very  gospel  of  "self-help"  for  which 
Schultze  stood  is  now  advocated  simply  and  directly 
in  the  catechisms  for  popular  socialist  instruction. 
(Almanack  des  Cooperateurs  Beiges,  1900.)  The 
truth  is  that  the  cooperatives  have  done  their  work 
so  well  that  the  members  see  the  necessity  of  saving, 
borrowing,  lending,  even  if  in  forms  that  violate  every 
theoretic  principle  of  socialism.  They  have  learned 
that  the  very  principle  of  association,  on  which  their 
whole  structure  must  be  built,  gets  its  strength 
through  the  encouragement  of  private  ownership,  not 
only  of  "  property  for  consumption  "  which  the  theory 
allows,  but  of  property  that  creates  personal  rent  and 
profits.  Precisely  that  has  come  about  which  the  old 
guard  of  revolutionaries  predicted :  "  Once  begin  to 
compromise,"  they  said,  "  with  the  reform  which  city, 
state,  or  bourgeois  has  sanctioned,  and  we  are  lost. 
Our  glory  and  our  strength  is  in  fighting  the  existing 
order,  not  in  preserving  and  improving  it."  Whether 


SOCIALISM  AT  WORK  343 

for  loss  or  gain,  the  irrevocable  step  has  been  taken. 
The  party  is  once  for  all  committed  to  the  slower  and 
humbler  ways  of  industrial  and  political  reforms  sanc- 
tioned by  an  experience  far  wider  than  that  which 
any  socialist  party  can  claim. 

All  that  is  best  in  socialism  will  gain  by  this  change. 
It  need  abate  no  jot  or  tittle  of  its  purpose  to  win  for 
society  every  increment  of  gain  that  proves  to  be 
"  unearned."  The  transformation  that  we  have  fol- 
lowed now  forces  it,  however,  to  use  means  and 
methods  that  are  educational;  that  furnish,  as  they 
are  applied,  their  own  tests  of  success  or  failure  ;  that 
tend  steadily  to  unite  men  as  friends,  and  not  to  divide 
them  as  enemies.1 

1  The  very  essence  of  "  self-help  "  as  applied  to  the  work  of  these 
cooperatives  is  seen  in  the  following  question  and  answer  in  a  catechism 
of  1899. 

D.  — Que  peuvent  done  faire  les  travailleurs? 

R.  —  Profiler  de  leurs  moments  de  loisir  pour  s'instruire,  apprendre 
a  se  diriger  eux-me'mes  au  lieu  de  remettre  le  soin  a  d'autres  d'agir 
pour  eux,  et  enfin  tacher  de  comprendre  et  d'utiliser  la  force  qui  reside 
dans  la  Cooperation,  p.  17. 


CHAPTER  XII 

NEXT   STEPS 

THESE  changes  of  temper,  of  method,  and  of  pur- 
pose open  to  society  every  chance  that  could  be 
asked  for  the  industrial  and  social  renovation  that 
in  some  way  must  come.  The  real  peril  which  we 
now  face  is  the  threat  of  a  class  conflict.  If  capital- 
ism insists  upon  the  policy  of  outraging  the  saving 
aspiration  of  the  American  workman  to  raise  his  stand- 
ard of  comfort  and  of  leisure,  every  element  of  class 
conflict  will  strengthen  among  us.  When  a  despatch 
is  sent  to  a  Southern  state,  asking  for  a  car-load  of 
negroes  to  break  a  strike,  we  see  in  concrete  form 
what  this  use  of  subject  and  lower  races  may  mean. 
Every  added  cable,  wire,  ship,  and  railway  which 
destroy  space,  make  it  easier  for  capital  to  turn  the 
lower  labor  standard  against  the  higher.  The  com- 
ing of  these  cheaper  immigrants  will  be  a  help,  if 
they  are  not  used  to  break  the  power  of  the  unions. 
Labor  organization,  in  spite  of  every  unhappy  fault 
that  can  be  laid  to  its  charge,  stands  for  the  higher 
standard  of  living.  To  break  it  means  longer  hours, 
lower  wages,  and  a  bitterer  competition  among  the 
workers. 

A  New  York  builder,  angered  by  delays  upon  his 
structure,  tells  me :  "  If  it  were  not  for  the  union,  I 
could  finish  it  in  two-thirds  of  the  time.  I  could  get 

344 


NEXT  STEPS  345 

ten  hours  a  day  out  of  them,  and  I  could  get  them 
one  dollar  and  a  half  cheaper.  I  could  bring  in 
young  fellows  from  the  country,  and  everything 
would  hum."  Yes,  that  is  precisely  what  he  could 
do.  He  could  have  great  speed,  cheaper  product,  and 
fewer  annoyances ;  but  it  would  all  be  at  the  expense 
of  that  higher  standard  of  labor  for  which  the  unions 
are  making  their  desperate  struggle.  The  cause  of 
labor  is,  upon  the  whole,  their  cause.  The  harassing 
annoyance  under  which  builders  and  architects,  for 
example,  now  suffer,  is  the  price  we  have  to  pay  for 
a  more  democratized  form  of  industry  that  some- 
where in  the  future  must  come.  Unless  every  ideal 
of  a  more  equal  life  is  to  be  given  up,  this  passion 
should  be  welcomed  for  the  uses  to  which  it  can  be 
put.  The  way  of  safety  is  to  educate  it,  the  way  of 
danger  is  to  deride  and  defeat  it. 

We  have  only  to  humiliate  what  is  best  in  the  as- 
piration of  the  trade  union,  and  then  every  worst  fea- 
ture of  socialism  is  fastened  upon  us.  There  is  no 
danger  in  socialism  that  for  a  moment  compares 
with  that  part  of  its  working  propaganda,  dear  to  the 
extremists  —  the  class  struggle.  To  make  men  believe 
in  the  fatalities  of  this  social  warfare  is  the  dead- 
liest work  in  which  any  human  being  can  engage. 
To  make  men  disbelieve  it,  by  organizing  agencies 
through  which  the  luminous  proof  appears  that  men 
can  do  their  work  together,  with  good-will,  rather 
than  hatred  in  their  hearts,  is  as  noble  a  service  as 
falls  to  us  in  this  world.  To  show  the  possibilities  of 
this  more  fraternal  and  peace-bringing  process,  I  have 
laid  much  stress  upon  the  changes  in  the  German  and 
Belgian  socialism.  There  could  be  no  better  news 


346  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

from  Germany,  for  instance,  than  the  new  chances 
which  these  changes  offer  for  the  socialists  and  trade 
unions  to  work  together  rather  than  in  enmity. 

In  1890,  there  were  perhaps  two  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  trade-union  members.  In  1899  there  were 
nearly  six  hundred  thousand.  These  can  now  frater- 
nize politically  with  socialists  in  the  common  aim  of 
securing  legislative  and  industrial  improvements. 

Middle-class  sympathizers  of  every  sort  can  also 
join  hands  with  social  democrats  for  the  same  re- 
forms. As  the  feeling  of  a  purely  class  conflict  fades 
out,  the  real  unity  will  be  seen  to  be,  not  one  of  voca- 
tions, but  of  opinion  and  purpose.  The  party  has 
from  the  first  owed  its  impulse  and  guidance  largely 
to  those  who  never  were  workingmen.  Dr.  Lieb- 
knecht,  Marx,  Engles,  Lassalle,  Guesde,  Jaures,  Hynd- 
man,  Brousse,  Ferri,  Vandervelde,  Kautsky,  Denis, 
are  but  a  few  of  the  many  to  show  what  the  party 
has  gained  from  those  who  were  in  no  sense  prole- 
tarians. Indeed,  no  darker  illusion  has  ever  troubled 
the  whole  labor  question  than  the  assumption  that 
there  is  an  identity  of  interests  in  the  entire  body  of 
wage  earners  as  against  some  other  class.  The 
Klassenkampf  rests  on  this  illusion.  This  was  one 
of  the  weaknesses  of  the  Knights  of  Labor.  General 
interests  came  into  speedy  conflict  with  special  trade- 
union  interests.  The  strength  of  the  Federation  of 
Labor  is  that  it  has  thus  far  shown  skill  to  avoid  this 
error.  It  is  admitted  that  the  interests  of  separate 
unions,  glass-blowers,  stone-cutters,  locomotive  engi- 
neers, may  at  any  time  be  much  closer  to  that  of  the 
employers  than  to  that  of  the  miners,  shoemakers,  or 
printers.  Large  leeway  is  therefore  given  for  the 


NEXT  STEPS  347 

play  of  special,  as  against  general,  interests.  Every 
sympathetic  strike  brings  this  fact  at  once  into 
evidence,  so  that  some  of  the  wisest  labor  leaders  now 
unite  in  condemning  the  sympathetic  strike. 

Nearly  one-half  of  the  strikes  in  the  last  quarter  of 
a  century  in  this  country  are  put  down  by  Colonel 
Wright  as  "successful,"  but  the  sympathetic  strike 
proper  is  an  almost  uninterrupted  story  of  defeat. 
In  warning  the  soft-coal  miners  not  to  engage  in  this 
kind  of  strike  (1902)  John  Mitchell  told  his  hearers 
he  had  never  known  a  sympathetic  strike  to  succeed. 
Trade  unionism  at  its  best  has  so  far  discovered  the 
great  fact  of  the  solidarity  of  interests  that  it  may 
easily  be  led  to  cooperate  rather  than  to  antagonize. 
If  we  are  moved  by  reason  and  fairness,  its  whole 
massive  strength  can  be  turned  against  our  greatest 
danger  —  the  class  struggle,  as  it  may  be  saved  from 
the  worst  error  of  the  English  unions,  the  limitation 
of  output. 

This  is  possible,  of  course,  only  through  measures 
that  are  educational ;  that  act  slowly  upon  the  habits 
of  thought  and  action.  But  the  word  "  education" 
leaves  us  in  the  air,  until  we  know,  with  some  pre- 
cision, what  it  is  to  be,  and  how  it  is  to  work.  This 
must  first  be  made  clear.  At  the  Remuneration 
Conference,  in  London,  I886,1  there  was  gathered 
perhaps  as  able  a  group  of  men  for  the  discussion  of 
the  social  question  as  has  ever  met  for  this  purpose : 
statesmen,  economists,  business  men,  and  artisans. 

In  an  informal  gathering,  I  heard  an  evening's 
dispute  in  which  practically  every  point  of  view  was 
represented :  the  individualist  of  every  shade,  the 
1  Report  of  Industrial  Remuneration  Conference. 


348  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

single  taxer,  the  positivist,  socialist,  and  the  business 
man,  who  was,  as  so  often  happens,  by  common  con- 
sent, the  gayest  theorizer  present  The  result  of  the 
long  symposium  was  what  has  often  been  noted  — 
practical  agreement  as  to  the  social  ideal  toward 
which  effort  should  be  directed.  All  alike  wanted  a 
society  in  which  opportunity  should  be  organized  so 
fully  and  so  fairly  that  each  could  have  every  chance 
which  his  character  and  ability,  industry  and  good-will, 
made  possible.  There  was  general  consent  that 
society,  as  now  organized,  does  not  offer  equal 
chances  except  to  a  small  minority.  The  brilliant 
publicist,  Frederic  Harrison,  after  thirty  years  of 
hard  work  upon  English  social  problems,  said  at  the 
morning  session,  that  the  need  of  social  reorganiza- 
tion had  come  to  be  so  urgent  that  unless  it  could 
be  brought  about,  we  were  to  be  left  in  a  condition 
"  which  is  hardly  an  advance  on  slavery  or  serfdom." 
There  was  also  agreement  that  sqciety,  through 
individuals,  or  associations,  or  laws,  has  power  to  re- 
move much  of  this  injustice.  With  one  exception  the 
agreement  here  came  to  an  end.  The  causes  of  so 
much  injustice,  and  above  all  the  means  for  its  re- 
moval, excited  dissensions.  The  thing  to  be  aimed  at, 
the  far  ideal  of  social  relationships,  awoke  no  dis- 
cords among  the  disputers.  A  society  in  which  each 
may  live  out  generously  and  gladly  his  largest  and 
freest  life ;  a  society  in  which  each  capability  may 
have  free  play,  with  the  infinite  social  variety  which 
that  implies,  was  the  Utopia  in  which  all  believed. 
Then  came  bickering  and  dissent  of  opinion  over 
ways  and  means  of  reaching  so  fair  a  goal,  and  finally, 
to  the  common  surprise,  agreement  again  —  agree- 


NEXT  STEPS  349 

ment  that  whatever  changes  befall  or  measures  are 
adopted,  the  race  must  have  a  training  and  a  discipline 
it  has  not  yet  received.  Education,  to  which  all  alike 
looked  forward,  was  thus  the  panacea  and  harmonizer. 
Happily,  for  the  evening's  peace,  no  one  raised  the 
question  as  to  the  kind  of  education  necessary  for 
this  high  service,  and  we  went  our  ways  pleased  with 
the  illusion  which  a  stately  platitude  often  gives. 

That  education  must  at  least  go  hand  in  hand  with 
social  betterment,  will  be  disputed  by  none.  When, 
however,  education  is  used  as  a  stop-gap  to  every 
proposal,  we  shall,  if  we  are  intelligent,  make  objec- 
tion. The  hoariest  commonplace  ever  used  against 
reforms  has  the  same  character,  "  You  can't  do  any- 
thing until  you  have  changed  human  nature."  What 
service  this  ancient  saw  has  done  from  age  to  age 
against  every  hint  of  abuse  to  be  overcome !  That 
"  golden  conduct  will  not  come  from  leaden  instinct," 
has  been  thoroughly  drilled  into  us. 

We  accept  the  admonition,  but  shall  reply,  if  we 
are  wise,  that  it  does  not  greatly  help  us,  unless 
something  very  definite  is  added  about  methods  and 
details.  A  community  that  is  civilized  enough  to  tax 
itself  for  an  education  under  which  the  bookish 
tradition  should  be  accompanied  by  several  years  of 
first-rate  art  and  manual  training,  under  which  the 
science,  begun  in  the  school  garden,  would  make  the 
farm  as  interesting  as  the  laboratory  or  the  artist's 
studio,  would  go  far  to  wipe  out  a  whole  class  of  social 
dangers  and  inequalities.  It  would  take  a  quarter  of 
a  million  children  from  maiming  industries  and  from 
street  avocations,  keeping  them  at  habit-making 
processes  until  they  were  seventeen  years  of  age. 


35O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

This  elimination  of  the  child  from  bread-winning 
occupations  would  lighten  the  crushing  weight  of 
competition  upon  the  very  class  that  now  staggers 
most  heavily  under  it. 

Clear  and  immense  as  the  gain  of  this  better  edu- 
cation would  be,  it  does  not  meet  all  our  difficulties. 
There  are  in  the  meantime  other  duties  to  be  met,  and 
another  sort  of  education  for  which  our  need  is  at 
least  as  great. 

From  an  educational  point  of  view,  what  is  the 
most  unanswerable  charge  that  can  be  brought 
against  our  current  industrial  system  ?  It  is  that, 
as  a  large  part  of  this  system  now  works  it  creates 
suspicion,  aversion,  or  stolid  indifference  which  may 
be  worse.  Great  portions  of  our  competitive  business 
have  come  to  act  upon  the  wage  earner  in  ways  that 
train  him  neither  toward  sympathy  with  his  employer 
nor  toward  a  sense  of  social  responsibility.  The 
"  great  business,"  managed  by  agents  under  direction 
of  absentee  proprietors,  has  intensified  this  evil.  A 
mine  operator  living  on  the  spot  said  to  me :  "  Our 
mining  population  has  been  getting  worse  and  worse 
each  year.  They  do  not  trust  us  nor  we  them,  and 
I  think  one  reason  is  that  the  direction  of  the  business 
has  so  largely  fallen  into  the  hands  of  men  who  live 
in  the  big  cities,  and  have  therefore  little  knowledge 
of  the  workmen  and  little  real  sympathy  with  them. 
They  have  to  trust  to  bosses  and  agents  who,  in  order 
to  make  a  good  showing,  have  to  take  it  out  of  the 
men." 

But  of  far  more  than  this  special  kind  of  industry, 
is  the  main  fact  true.  I  once  showed  to  a  manager 
of  one  of  our  largest  department  stores  a  summa- 


NEXT   STEPS  351 

rized  plan  of  the  cooperative  method  in  the  famous 
Bon  March<£  in  Paris.  By  the  very  nature  of  its  busi- 
ness organization  it  binds  an  army  of  clerks  to  the 
store  and  its  interests.  The  American  manager  said, 
"  I  know  the  Paris  store  well ;  we  can  beat  it  in  many 
ways,  but  in  one  way  it  beats  us  :  their  organization 
educates  and  ours  doesn't."  He  was  proud  of  the 
trained  clerical  efficiency  in  his  own  store,  but  by 
education  under  the  cooperative  influence  he  meant 
a  discipline  that  brought  an  ever  enlarging  sympathy 
with  the  business  in  its  entire  social  relations.  If 
then,  we  are  to  use  the  word  "  education  "  as  a  remedy 
for  industrial  weaknesses,  we  should  understand  that 
all  that  is  outside  and  apart  from  the  interior  active 
business  processes  cannot  make  in  the  workman 
those  habits  of  thought  and  of  action  which  society 
most  needs.  Neither  our  business  nor  our  politics 
is  any  longer  safe  unless  education  means  at  least 
as  much  as  this,  —  the  sum  of  influences  which  act 
upon  the  laborer  continuously  in  his  daily  craft.  Much 
of  our  industry  educates  in  the  sense'  of  producing 
every  degree  of  skilled  performance.  It  may  do 
nothing  to  educate  socially  or  fraternally.  It  has 
come  very  widely  to  do  the  exact  opposite  of  this. 
There  can  be  no  "  remedy  "  deserving  the  name  that 
does  not  recognize  the  necessity  of  so  modifying  the 
relations  of  employer  and  employed  that  the  daily 
work  shall  instruct  both  parties  in  those  things  that 
bind  together,  rather  than  antagonize.  It  is  the 
obvious  curse  of  a  great  part  of  competitive  work 
that  it  now  induces  antagonism  between  manager 
and  helper.  It  does  this  in  an  increasing  number  of 
industries  not  accidentally,  but  in  the  very  nature  of 


352  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

the  working  relation  between  them.  This  autumn, 
in  Milwaukee,  Chicago,  Detroit,  Grand  Rapids,  Cleve- 
land, Columbus,  and  Cincinnati,  I  heard  the  testi- 
m.pny  of  business  managers  of  affairs  into  which 
strong  unions  had  come,  but  with  no  organized  rec- 
ognition by  employers.  The  testimony  was  almost 
a  unit  upon  this  point.  "  The  relations  with  our  men 
are  getting  to  be  so  strained  and  so  delicate  that  they 
cannot  go  on  without  some  change  that  is  more  than 
mere  patchwork."  The  man  standing  at  the  head  of 
his  business  in  Chicago  said,  "  It  has  been  getting 
gradually  worse  and  now  is  so  nearly  intolerable 
that  I  wonder  why  we  do  not  all  quit  business." 
While  blaming  trade  unions  for  this,  every  one  of 
these  gentlemen  had  come  to  recognize  that  the 
trade  union  could  not  be  got  rid  of. 

This  situation  has  then  to  be  faced, —  organized  capi- 
tal and  organized  labor  side  by  side,  both  alike  grow- 
ing in  strength.  For  a  quite  indefinite  future  these 
must  work  together.  In  what  spirit  and  through  what 
methods  is  this  inevitable  fellowship  to  be  carried  on  ? 
I  have  just  put  this  exact  question  to  the  second 
largest  coal  operator  known  to  me.  He  answers  thus, 
"  It  is  my  deliberate  opinion  that  we  must  continue  to 
fight  the  unions  with  all  the  strength  we  possess,  it 
will  be  safer  than  any  hopeless  attempt  to  educate 
them  into  common  sense." 

I  have  tried  to  show  that  if  he,  and  those  who 
think  with  him  should  do  this  and  succeed,  we  should 
have  an  increase  of  stormy  political  socialism.  But 
the  attempt  will  be  difficult.  Public  opinion  will  more 
and  more  demand  that  labor  shall  have  every  right 
of  organization  (with  federation  and  representation) 


NEXT  STEPS  353 

to  which  capital  lays  claim.  Late  in  the  recent  strike 
I  found  in  a  town  of  the  middle  West,  the  leading 
business  men  (in  no  way  interested  in  bituminous 
coal)  generous  subscribers  to  the  striking  miners. 
Judges,  bankers,  editors,  and  even  the  president  of 
a  corporation  were  among  the  subscribers.  One  of 
the  richest  and  most  active  business  men  told  me, 
"  I  and  most  of  my  friends  would  have  subscribed 
every  month  until  those  miners  got  their  claims  be- 
fore a  fair  arbitration  board." 

This  is  the  new  force  of  public  opinion  with  which 
the  old  dictatorial  and  arbitrary  method  of  the  em- 
ployer (especially  in  semi-public  corporations)  will 
henceforth  have  to  deal.  In  this  surly  fellowship  be- 
tween organized  capital  and  organized  labor,  both  par- 
ties have  to  be  educated.  The  lesson  for  the  employer 
is,  that  some  way  has  to  be  found  in  which  work  can 
be  carried  on  with  complete  recognition  of  associated 
labor.  This  will  involve  such  modification  of  the  famil- 
iar, arbitrary,  and  individualistic  method  as  to  admit 
what  in  most  of  the  great  business,  is  essentially  the 
spirit  of  a  partnership.  In  letter  and  in  law  this  is  still 
far  in  the  future,  but  the  spirit  of  it  will  have  to  be 
admitted  and  acted  upon.  I  have  given  the  consenting 
testimony  of  first-rate  men  of  affairs  upon  this  point. 
The  coal  operator,  just  quoted,  said  to  me,  "  What  I 
hate  is,  that  we  can't  really  recognize  organized  labor 
without  getting  into  a  box ;  our  men  would  soon  think 
they  were  in  some  way  partners  with  us." 

A  soft-coal  operator  in  Illinois,  who  has  definitely 
recognized  the  miners'  association,  said,  "  It  gives  me 
the  chills  sometimes  to  hear  my  men  talk  as  if  they, 
too,  were  actually  in  the  business."  The  process 

2A 


354  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

may  add  fever  to  the  chills,  but  it  is  the  way  through 
which  the  unwilling  parties  have  to  pass.  We  can- 
not encourage  millions  of  low-class  laborers  to  come 
to  us  without  incurring  responsibilities.  From  the 
first  act  of  Congress  at  the  close  of  the  Civil  War  "  to 
encourage  immigration,"  to  the  action  of  companies 
to  "  assist  in  carrying  out  the  intention  of  Congress," 
the  class  which  makes  much  of  our  trouble  has  been 
encouraged  to  come.  Anthracite  operators  welcomed 
the  "Slav"  because  he  could  keep  wages  down  and 
break  strikes,  as  was  done  in  1887-1888.  Those  who 
have  profited  by  these  luxuries  of  "  wage  depressors  " 
and  "  strike  breakers  "  should  no  longer  shirk  corre- 
sponding responsibilities.1 

Moreover,  once  getting  this  polyglot  multitude  here, 
what  has  been  done  to  civilize  them  by  those  who  have 
grown  rich  from  the  miners'  toil  ?  In  many  journeys 
I  have  found  two  paltry  gifts  in  all  those  blackened 
districts,  calculated  to  civilize  and  soften  conditions. 

In  one  of  the  richest  of  the  towns,  washed  by  a 
noble  river  running  too  swiftly  for  safe  bathing, 
I  asked  a  citizen  why,  in  such  a  place,  there  were  no 
public  baths.  The  evening  had  brought  to  the  pretty 
banks  hundreds  of  miners  and  their  wives.  I  got 
this  answer :  "  I  live  among  the  swells  myself.  We 
have  a  lot  of  them.  They  are  sometimes  here,  some- 
times in  Europe.  All  their  riches  came  from 
royalties,  or  in  some  way  from  the  mines.  I  made  a 
canvass  for  baths  because  the  miners  and  their 
families  have  to  live  in  such  dirt  and  because  the 
luxury  could  be  given  to  thousands  of  these  men  and 
women  at  so  reasonable  an  outlay.  No  influence 

1  House  Reports,  5<3th  Congress,  4147,  2d  session. 


NEXT  STEPS  355 

that  I  possess  can  produce  the  slightest  effect.  We 
have  some  nobly  charitable  women  and  a  few  men 
who  will  give  to  the  local  hospital,  but  as  for  any 
sense  of  responsibility  for  these  thousands  of  miners, 
it  has  no  existence."  Careful  search  might  show  some 
startling  exception  to  this  charge ;  but  this  gentleman's 
opinion  is  that  of  every  investigator  of  this  region.  I 
have  looked  at  scores  of  great  industries  at  home  and 
abroad,  but  nowhere  have  I  ever  seen  a  blacker  con- 
trast between  great  private  gains  and  any  sense  of 
civic  responsibility  for  the  masses  who  wear  out  their 
lives  in  and  about  the  mines.  My  object  in  calling 
attention  to  this  ungracious  fact  is  to  show  where  ulti- 
mate responsibility  must  also  be  fixed  for  lawlessness 
and  disorder  that  break  out  in  time  of  great  excitement. 
That  kind  of  population,  so  long  and  so  dangerously 
neglected,  will  develop  some  brutal  types,  as  naturally 
as  the  miner's  occupation  tattoos  him  with  scars.1 

In  this  industry  as  in  many  others,  the  time  is  now 
passed  when  patriarchal  benignities,  mere  "doing 
something  for  the  laborers,"  will  meet  the  need.  Less 
and  less  will  labor  be  deceived  by  any  dole  of  pat- 
ronage. In  the  class  of  industries  here  considered, 
organization  of  employer  and  employed  must  now  find 
a  working  relation  that  educates,  because  of  the  very 
nature  of  the  affiliation  in  which  they  stand  to  each 
other.  A  common  education  must  replace  a  one-sided 
benevolence. 

Before  reaching  the  details  of  this  relationship,  the 
frailties  and  offences  of  labor  organization  have  to  be 

1  For  a  vivid  contrast  in  method  and  result,  see  Annual  Report  of 
the  Sociological  Department  of  the  Colorado  Fuel  and  Iron  Company, 
1901-1902. 


356  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

stated.  They  are  as  real  as  any  upon  the  side  of 
capital,  even  if  there  is  more  excuse  for  them.  The  sin 
and  the  weakness  of  the  trade  union  has  been  (i)  in 
its  attitude  toward  the  non-union  man ;  (2)  in  its  sullen 
aversion  to  new  inventions ;  (3)  in  its  too  willing  as- 
sent to  check  the  output  of  work ;  (4)  in  its  tendency 
to  discourage  the  best  endeavor  among  the  better  and 
stronger  workers ;  (5)  in  its  too  free  use  of  the 
sympathetic  strike;  (6)  in  a  far  too  reckless  use 
of  the  boycott.1  The  worst  of  our  unions  are 
guilty  of  every  one  of  these  counts  against  them. 
The  average  union  is  guilty  in  the  case  of  part  of 
them,  but  the  best  and  strongest  unions  have  already 
risen  pretty  clearly  and  cleanly  above  them  all. 
Enemies  of  the  unions  are  fond  of  telling  us  that  "  if 
all  unions  were  like  the  locomotive  engineers,  business 
interests  would  be  safe."  Yes,  but  that  is  what  this 
body  of  workmen  has  slowly  reached.  Its  earlier  his- 
tory is  black  enough.  Other  unions  .have  grown  safe 
only  through  experience  and  responsibilities.  The 
advance  guard  of  unionism  is  at  the  present  moment 
in  the  United  States  one  of  the  most  conservative  in- 
fluences active  among  us.  After  life-long  familiar- 
ity with  the  trade  union,  Commissioner  C.  D.  Wright 
states  that  "as  a  rule  trade  unions  oppose  strikes"; 
that  they  "  are  growing  more  and  more  conservative." 
"  As  a  rule  they  are  friendly  to  machinery."  2 

1  That  the  boycott  is  not  in  itself  an  evil  is  seen  in  the  fact  that  most 
decent  people  boycott  something.     It  may  be  the  saloon,  the  brothel, 
and  the  gambling  den,  or  a  vicious  play  at  the  theatre.     In  a  proved 
case  of  injustice  or  indecency  this  "  organized  disapprobation  "  has  its 
moral  justification.     The  trade  union  abuse  of  this  lies  in  the  fact  of 
the  too  frequent,  reckless,  and  indiscriminate  use  of  the  boycott. 

2  See  Contemporary  Review,  November,  1902. 


NEXT   STEPS  357 

It  has  been  shown  that  our  trade  unions  have  be- 
come socialistic,  but  it  is  a  socialism  that  is  safe, 
if  we  do  our  duty.  It  is  safe  because  it  asks  for  a 
tentative  extension  of  city  or  state  functions.  It  asks 
this,  knowing  that  if  a  city  cannot  manage  electric 
lighting,  for  example,  better  than  a  private  company, 
the  people  are  not  in  the  least  likely  to  continue  that 
sort  of  socialism.  If  it  prove  that  city  management 
is  more  wasteful,  less  alert  to  apply  new  inventions, 
more  reckless  of  the  peoples'  interest,  they  will  not 
continue  this  inferior  policy. 

The  kind  of  training  which  strong  trade  unionism 
(like  the  Federation  of  Labor)  brings  to  the  workers, 
leads  them  to  understand  how  slowly  and  how  experi- 
mentally these  changes  must  be  made.  I  have  sat 
through  a  week's  session  of  the  Federation  of  Labor, 
learning  there  that  nowhere  is  the  socialist  who  makes 
silly  or  wild  proposals  so  instantly  and  so  summarily 
disposed  of.  Nowhere  does  a  crank  have  a  harder  time 
of  it.  If  we  omit  certain  unions  in  the  more  corrupt 
cities,  where  the  leaders  learn  bad  habits  by  imitation 
and  are  too  frequently  bought  and  sold,  there  is  at  the 
present  moment  in  this  country  no  more  powerful  in- 
fluence to  train  men  for  citizenship  than  the  influences 
at  work  in  the  best  and  strongest  labor  organizations. 
This  is  true  of  the  Federation ;  it  is  true  of  separate 
unions  like  the  printers,  trainmen,  iron  moulders ; 
many  of  the  longshoremen,  and  cigar-makers. 

But  especially  do  these  older  and  stronger  unions 
learn  to  check  dangerous  and  revolutionary  opinions. 
If  there  is  any  considerable  threatening  socialism  of 
the  latter  sort  in  our  midst,  it  has  no  such  enemy  as 
the  trade  union.  As  the  trade  union  strengthens,  its 


358  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

influence  against  turbulent  and  revolutionary  projects 
steadily  increases.  The  only  agency  that  will  prevent 
the  spread  of  this  conservatism  is  the  fatuous  obstinacy 
which  insists  upon  defeating  completer  labor  organi- 
zation. 

No  one  can  study  the  growth  of  the  trade  union 
in  every  country,  where  capitalistic  organization  within 
ten  years  has  made  its  great  strides,  without  seeing 
that  the  new  ambitions  and  successes  of  unionism  are 
probably  as  great  an  event  socially  and  industrially 
as  the  "  trust."  The  least  astute  must  now  see  that 
the  trade  union  has  already  won  a  strength  that  is 
neither  to  be  ignored  nor  too  much  affronted.  The 
puerile  cry  to  "  down  "  the  trust  is  only  matched 
for  inanity  by  the  cry  to  down  the  trade  union. 
Both  are  attempts,  through  organization,  to  check 
certain  evils  which  an  unreined  competition  at  last 
produces.  Both  equally  must  be  accepted  for  their 
uses. 

In  the  case  of  both,  we  have  to  learn  that  oldest 
and  hardest  lesson  —  to  distinguish  between  uses  and 
abuses.  Has  federated  capital  fewer  abuses  than 
federated  labor  ?  The  abuses  of  the  trade  union  are 
far  more  open  and  ill-mannered ;  they  appear  on  the 
surface  to  violate  more  impudently  social  usages  by 
which  we  set  great  store.  But  if  both  trust  and 
union  could  have  impartial  analysis,  there  is  no 
social  good  (like  freedom  and  human  rights)  that 
would  not  be  found  to  suffer  in  deeper  and  more 
dangerous  ways  from  the  abuses  of  certain  capital- 
istic organizations  than  from  those  of  labor.  The 
problem  is  to  check  and  eliminate  the  abuses  of  both. 
Legal  procedure  will  play  an  indispensable  part  in 


NEXT  STEPS  359 

this,  but  education  will  play  a  part  weightier  still. 
Most  of  the  stronger  labor  leaders  in  the  United 
States  are  now  ready  to  use  their  combined  influence 
in  favor  of  an  organization  that  shall  be  strong 
enough  and  intelligent  enough  to  put  no  undue  check 
upon  new  machinery  or  upon  the  output  of  labor. 
They  are  more  and  more  against  a  reckless  use  of 
the  sympathetic  strike.  The  best  of  them  say  openly, 
that  the  whole  policy  shall  be  to  train  their  men  into 
fairness  toward  non-union  men.  The  head  of  the 
garment  workers  tells  me,  "You  may  say  without 
qualification  that  this  is  our  aim,  and  that  we  shall 
work  steadily  toward  such  an  education  of  our  men 
as  finally  to  bring  it  about."  The  head  of  the  loco- 
motive engineers  says  expressly  that  they  will  in  no 
way  intimidate  non-union  men.  Mr.  Sargent  of  the 
firemen's  union  writes  :  "  When  strikes  are  declared, 
the  men  should  go  home  and  stay  there.  If  any  men 
can  be  secured  to  take  their  places,  let  them  take 
them.  In  the  past  there  has  been  too  much  coercion 
and  too  little  instruction  and  education  along  these 
lines." 

Mr.  Gompers,  John  Mitchell,  Harry  White,  give  in 
the  same  strong  testimony  as  to  the  purpose  of  edu- 
cating their  followers  up  to  broader  and  sounder  prin- 
ciples. In  The  Garment  Worker,  November  22,  1902, 
an  editorial  dealing  with  the  unions  contains  these 
words  :  "  Browbeating  or  violence  on  their  part  can- 
not be  defended.  Where  that  is  resorted  to,  the  ethi- 
cal purpose  of  the  movement  becomes  obscure,  and 
hatreds  are  engendered  that  offset  the  brotherly  spirit 
upon  which  it  is  founded.  No  matter  how  serious  the 
evils  to  be  combated,  barbarism  cannot  be  overcome 


360  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

by  more  barbarism.  If  the  benefits  of  the  union  can- 
not be  made  apparent  to  the  non-member,  and  if  the 
influence  which  they  can  exert  collectively  is  insuffi- 
cient to  induce  him  to  join,  then  their  cause  has  little 
strength." 

Aroused  at  last  upon  these  questions,  let  the  public 
take  these  men  at  their  word ;  hold  them  to  the  re- 
sponsibilities implied,  and  try  to  aid  them  in  seeing 
that  they  are  fulfilled.  Merely  to  fight  the  trade 
union  is  to  get  back  from  it  all  that  is  worst  in  it  and 
nothing  that  is  best ;  merely  to  fight  it,  intensifies  the 
very  ills  we  most  condemn.  To  help  it  educationally 
is  to  work  in  sympathy  with  its  general  purpose, 
while  showing  no  quarter  to  abuses  which  the  leaders 
themselves  admit.  Those  who  now  direct  labor  or- 
ganization have  learned,  within  ten  years,  the  almost 
resistless  power  of  public  opinion  to  determine  the 
issues  of  a  quarrel  when  that  opinion  is  once 
awakened. 

What  the  fighting  class  of  employers  has  been  slow 
to  learn,  is  that  they  are  losing  their  power  of  disciplin- 
ing their  own  workmen.  In  industries  where  union- 
ism is  inevitable,  the  arbitrary  rule  of  the  employer 
has  seen  its  day.  The  man  who  has  power  to 
discipline  the  workmen  is  more  and  more  their  own 
trade-union  leader.  In  the  work  of  education  and  of 
discipline,  the  employer  must  now  actually  have  the 
help  of  his  workmen's  representative.  There  is  hap- 
pily nothing  to  invent  or  create  anew  in  the  modus 
operandi.  The  mechanism  is  already  in  use  and  the 
education  has  begun.  It  is  among  the  printers,  the 
longshoremen,  the  soft-coal  miners,  the  iron  moulders, 
and  the  Boston  carpenters.  It  is  the  "joint  agree- 


NEXT  STEPS  361 

ment"  between  employer  and  employed  which  in- 
volves complete  recognition  of  labor  organization. 
Contracts  have  to  be  made  periodically  between  dele- 
gated committees  as  to  wages  and  all  important  con- 
ditions under  which  the  work  is  done.  It  involves 
systematized  arbitration  not  from  without  but  from 
within.  It  puts  every  natural  difficulty  in  the  way  of 
the  strike.  It  involves  organized  discussion  between 
masters  and  men  on  every  interest  that  concerns  their 
common  occupation. 

In  Chicago,  that  squally  home  of  rough  and  undis- 
ciplined trade  unionism,  I  was  told  by  the  able  lawyer, 
A.  F.  Hatch,  who  some  thirteen  years  ago  drew  the 
agreement  between  the  printers  and  the  Daily  Press 
Association,  that  "  it  has  worked  upon  the  whole  with 
the  best  of  results.  It  has  been  put  once  to  the  great- 
est possible  strain,  but  the  men  stood  by  their  con- 
tract in  spite  of  extreme  provocation."  The  manager 
of  one  of  the  two  or  three  largest  stove  manufactories 
in  the  United  States  told  me :  "  We  have  tried  it  a 
dozen  years  and  it  has  settled  all  questions  on  this 
subject  for  us.  Its  best  trait  is  that,  as  it  works,  it 
trains  the  men  to  see  the  limits  within  which  they 
can  get  advantages.  It  makes  the  men  more  conser- 
vative and  it  makes  us  more  considerate." 

The  joint-agreement  has  had  its  severest  tests 
among  the  low-class  miners  of  the  soft-coal  regions. 
In  much  criticism  that  has  been  given  me  in  Illinois 
from  employers,  the  worst  was  that  it  made  the  miners 
"  too  aggressive  for  what  they  considered  their  rights." 
"  They  want  to  take  too  much  of  the  business  into 
their  own  hands,  as  if  they  were  part  owners."  That 
the  agreement  should  have  worked  so  long  among 


362  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

these  rough  and  untrained  nationalities,  is  perhaps 
the  greatest  tribute  to  its  future  promise.  The  real 
irritation  of  these  employers  is  that  their  old  power 
of  absolute  decision  is  now  called  in  question.  In  the 
long  period  that  is  now  coming  to  an  end,  the  em- 
ployer has  been  dictator  not  only  of  his  own  business, 
but  of  interests  which  concerned  his  workmen  as  well. 
The  laborer  has  now  entered  the  fight  to  divide  this 
authority.  He  insists  upon  taking  his  part  in  the 
discussions  (as  to  hours,  wages,  conditions),  which  are 
strictly  his  business  also. 

The  employer  will  long  continue  to  fight  for  the 
whole  power.  The  only  limit  he  likes  is  implied  in 
the  phrase,  "  Take  this  work  at  a  given  wage  or  leave 
it."  A  thoughtful  and  law-abiding  miner  in  Spring 
Valley  told  me  in  time  of  a  strike  :  "  I  was  brought 
here  and  urged  to  buy  a  home  for  my  family ;  I  have 
half-paid  for  it ;  we  have  a  grievance  which  they  will 
not  arbitrate,  but  they  tell  me  if  I  don't  like  the  work 
to  leave  it.  I  cannot  leave  without  sacrificing  the 
savings  of  twelve  years.  They  tie  me  to  this  spot 
and  then  tell  me  to  submit  or  get  out."  This  man 
was  fighting  for  a  chance  to  help  decide  the  conditions 
under  which  he  worked  and  lived. 

This  is  what  the  employer  now  calls  "interfering 
with  my  business."  He  expects  sympathy  when  he 
asks,  "  Shall  I  manage  my  own  business  or  not  ? " 
Yes,  he  shall  manage  his  own  business,  but  precisely 
what  his  own  business  is,  calls  for  new  definitions.  It 
is  here  organized  labor  is  carrying  on  its  struggle. 
It  is  trying  to  determine  what,  in  the  business, 
should  be  decided  by  labor  and  what  by  employer. 
Where  the  trade  union  has  become  fair,  it  knows 


NEXT  STEPS  363 

and  admits  that  the  employer  must  have  absolute 
and  instant  control  over  all  that  strictly  concerns  him 
as  managing  director. 

This  contest  over  ultimate  decisions  between  em- 
ployer and  employed  is  so  at  the  heart  of  the  whole 
issue  that  I  submit  an  actual  instance,  every  detail  of 
which  is  very  recent  history.  An  employer  complains 
that  the  trade  union  objects  to  his  discharging  two 
incompetent  workmen.  If  it  were  a  fact,  the  union 
would  deserve  every  rebuking  condemnation  that 
could  be  given  to  it.  Scores  of  unions  are  constantly 
exercising  these  small  tyrannies,  but  the  employers 
have  so  long  had  the  habit  of  making  a  charge  of 
incompetence  in  order  to  get  rid  of  trade-union  men, 
that  unions  strike  back  in  self-defence.  In  this  in- 
stance, however,  I  give  a  letter  which  the  secretary 
of  a  great  'group  of  trade  unions  writes  to  a  local 
labor  agent  on  this  subject  of  what  is  the  workman's 
business  and  what  is  not. 

"  Mr.  -  — ,  foreman  of ,  informs  me  that  your 

only  reason  for  calling  out  the  men  was  that  he 
refused  to  continue  in  his  employ  two  men  laid  off 
for  incompetent  work,  and  that  even  your  business 
agent  admitted  that  the  work  of  the  men  was  imper- 
fect. If  such  is  the  case,  your  action  in  withdrawing 
the  men  was  not  justified.  This  office,  as  well  as  the 
National  Union,  is  opposed  to  forcing  upon  an  em- 
ployer men  whose  work  is  not  suitable.  It  is  just 
that  sort  of  thing  that  creates  needless  opposition  to 
the  union,  and  causes  no  end  of  trouble.  Your  union 
is  the  only  one  that  would  make  such  a  demand. 
Where  members  are  made  to  believe  that  they  cannot 
be  discharged,  no  matter  what  they  do,  they  become 


364  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

careless,  and  the  poor  workman  falls  back  upon  the 
protection  of  the  union.  The  employer  has  got  to 
sell  the  goods,  and  he  assumes  the  risk,  consequently 
he  alone  can  be  the  judge  as  to  the  quality  of  work. 
As  long  as  he  pays  the  union  scale  and  does  not  dis- 
criminate against  active  members,  that  is  all  you  can 
expect  of  him. 

"  Now  I  trust  you  will  not  place  us  in  a  position 
where  the  General  .Executive  Board  will  have  to 
decide  against  you. 

"Yours  Fraternally, 

"  HENRY  WHITE,  General  Secretary" 

This  is  in  no  way  an  exception.  It  is  a  frequent 
decision  of  the  chief  officers  affiliated  with  the  Fed- 
eration of  Labor.  What  a  critical  public  is  slow  to 
understand  is  that  this  is  a  powerful  and  increas- 
ing influence  in  most  of  our  stronger  trade  unions. 
Under  the  joint-agreement,  it  will  increase  still  more. 
I  have  known  the  head  of  a  labor  organization,  after 
seeing  that  the  employer  was  right,  to  force  one  of 
his  own  unions  back  to  work  by  sending  non-union 
men  (scabs)  to  bring  his  men  to  reason.  The  worst 
and  most  dangerous  forces  of  ignorance  in  the  unions 
can  be  disciplined  far  more  effectively  by  those  who 
direct  the  unions  than  by  the  employers.  Directors 
of  those  affairs  into  which  unionism  has  come,  must 
use  this  influence  of  labor  leaders  to  preserve  order, 
efficiency,  and  good  behavior  among  the  men.  The 
cynical  observers  of  the  union  have  not  learned  the 
kind  of  power  that  the  best  leaders  can  exercise  over 
their  men.  In  a  formidable  strike  I  asked  an  em- 
ployer why  he  refused  to  treat  with  the  union.  He 


NEXT  STEPS  365 

said,  "The  men  have  become  bumptious  and  surly, 
and  we  had  to  fight  it  out."  I  then  put  this  question 
to  the  trade-union  official,  "  Would  you  make  a  defi- 
nite public  statement,  and  promise  that  if  you  were 
'recognized'  and  the  responsibility  thrown  sharply 
upon  you  of  keeping  your  men  peaceably  at  work, 
giving  absolute  power  to  the  employer  to  discharge 
every  incompetent  and  unmanageable  workman, 
could  you  and  would  you  take  that  responsibility  ? " 
His  instant  reply  was :  "  That  is  precisely  what  we 
want.  If  the  employer  will  not  use  these  excuses  to 
break  our  union,  but  will  discharge  only  the  men  who 
are  impudent,  or  disobedient,  or  do  bad  work,  he  shall 
have  every  assistance  we  can  give  him  to  clear  out 
such  men.  We  can  make  it  hotter  for  those  men 
than  he  can.  They  are  afraid  of  our  power,  they 
are  not  afraid  of  his.  Give  us  the  responsibility  with 
an  adequate  contract,  and  I  will  promise  before  the 
public  to  keep  our  men  at  work.  I  should  like  to 
have  the  full  glare  of  public  opinion  thrown  on  us. 
We  would  promise  publicly  that  if  we  cannot  disci- 
pline our  own  men,  and  let  the  employer  discharge 
every  man  fairly  proved  to  be  troublesome,  lazy,  or 
incompetent,  we  will  confess  as  publicly  that  trade 
unions  are  a  failure." 

Now  if  we  care  for  the  thing  called  education, 
responsibility  of  this  character  must  be  given. 
"  Fighting  it  out "  is  one  resource,  but  it  is  stupid 
and  objectless.  The  joint-agreement,  practically 
adapted  to  each  business  after  its  nature  and  condi- 
tions, is  not  free  from  perplexities,  but  every  step  in 
its  application  and  enforcement  educates  in  the  only 
possible  direction  in  which  industry  must  move,  if  it 


366  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

moves  in  the  way  of  progress.  There  is  no  ray  of 
hope  except  in  some  method  that  forces  the  two  par- 
ties to  work  more  and  more  together,  instead  of  more 
and  more  apart.  There  is  nowhere  a  substitute  for 
this  compelling  common  action  that  teaches  the 
employer  what  is  just,  possible,  and  right  in  the  new 
claims  of  labor,  and  teaches  labor  the  difficulties  and 
the  limitations  within  which  modern  business  can  be 
made  a  success. 

Let  the  disciplinary  influence  of  the  joint-agree- 
ment do  its  work  for  some  years,  and  "  incorporation" 
will  at  least  get  the  hearing  which  is  now  impossible. 
To  reach  this  incorporation  by  the  help  and  sympathy 
of  the  union  is  far  safer  than  to  imitate  England's 
recent  step  of  forcing  incorporation.  Force  will 
merely  increase  the  socialistic  temper  of  the  unions. 
To  win  them  by  the  slower  processes  of  education 
through  added  responsibilities  is  a  far  safer  policy. 

Toward  this,  the  joint-agreement  will  help.  I  do 
not  make  the  absurd  claim  that  this  systematized 
understanding  between  the  two  parties  is  a  panacea. 
Because  the  word  "panacea"  is  rejected,  it  does  not 
follow  that  the  more  modest  proposal  may  not  have 
what  is  relatively  a  very  supreme  importance.  The 
evidence  is  overwhelming  that  this  importance  may 
be  fairly  attributed  to  the  joint-agreement  if  only 
employers  will  bring  to  it  something  of  their  real 
strength  and  sympathy.  It  gives  us  arbitration  in 
its  very  highest  form  ;  that  is,  from  within.  It  gives 
it  in  the  one  way  to  secure  every  enlightening  educa- 
tional advantage.  It  is  to  the  joint-agreement  that 
we  must  look  for  our  best  answer  to  all  premature 
calls  for  trade-union  incorporation.  At  present  the 


NEXT  STEPS  367 

unions  are  right  in  rejecting  it.  Multitudes  of  men, 
especially  among  the  newer  immigrants,  would  see  in 
this  power  of  the  court  a  reason  for  not  joining  the 
unions.  Until  they  have  reached  a  greater  strength 
and  stability,  incorporation  would  hamper  them  in 
the  best  work  they  are  now  doing.  But  the  point 
I  urge  is,  that  the  joint-agreement  does  a  far  better 
educational  work.  To  keep  agreements  voluntarily, 
is  a  much  higher  discipline  than  to  do  it  under  force. 
For  many  years  unions  have  actually  kept  con- 
tracts when  employers  have  genuinely  and  heartily 
cooperated  with  the  joint-agreement 

There  is  no  such  convincing  proof  of  this  as  the 
fifteen  years'  trial  between  masters  and  men  in  the 
Boston  Building  Trades.  The  agent  of  the  em- 
ployers, W.  H.  Sayward,  who  brought  about  this 
agreement,  conducting  it  with  growing  success  for 
eighteen  years,  allows  me  to  say  that  under  it  scores 
of  strikes  have  been  prevented,  millions  of  money 
saved,  and  the  most  delicate  questions,  like  the  limi- 
tation of  output  and  apprentices,  the  use  of  the  boy- 
cott, the  conflicts  between  different  unions,  and  the 
sympathetic  strike,  are  now  so  far  understood  as  a  re- 
sult of  this  education  that  they  are  no  longer  feared. 

Speaking  from  the  side  of  the  employers,  Mr. 
Sayward  says  :  "  My  experience  has  convinced  me 
that  labor  thoroughly  organized  and  honestly  recog- 
nized is  even  more  important  for  the  employer  than  for 
the  workmen.  It  makes  possible  a  working  method 
between  the  two  parties  which  removes  one  by  one 
the  most  dangerous  elements  of  conflict  and  misunder- 
standing." 

It  is  from  these  building  trade  unions,  in  cities  like 


368  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

Chicago  and  New  York,  that  many  of  our  worst  abuses 
have  come.  It  is  here  that  the  architect,  as  between 
the  devil  and  the  deep  sea,  has  his  most  tormenting 
experience.  It  is  here  that  the  bribing  and  buying 
of  walking-delegates  have  done  their  pernicious  work. 
Mr.  Sayward  says,  "  Not  one  of  these  evils  is  neces- 
sary, they  can  be  educated  out  of  the  way."  Where 
the  union  has  been  openly  recognized  under  this  joint- 
agreement,  and  the  representatives  of  employer  and 
employed  have  learned  the  habit  of  meeting  difficulties 
as  they  arise,  the  terrors  of  the  walking-delegate  and 
the  "scab"  begin  to  disappear.  The  name  "walking- 
delegate"  is  replaced  by  "business  agent."  Mr.  Say- 
ward  says  :  "  I  no  longer  either  fear  or  object  to  the 
walking-delegate.  I  see  that  he  is  a  necessity  to 
the  best  work  of  the  union."  In  an  address  before 
the  National  Association  of  Builders,1  Mr.  Sayward 
criticises  the  employers  for  saying  that  they  will  not 
treat  with  the  unions  until  they  are  improved.  "This," 
he  says,  "  is  like  asking  the  child  to  swim  but  not  go 
near  the  water."  The  employer  must  take  part  in 
this  educational  work  as  a  very  condition  of  its  success. 
In  closing  this  address,  Mr.  Sayward  said,  "  that  either 
for  the  building  trades  or  other  lines  of  work,  these 
intricate  and  involved  matters  will  not  take  care  of 
themselves ;  they  cannot  safely  be  intrusted  to  one  of 
the  interested  parties  alone ;  both  parties  must  have 
equal  concern,  must  act  jointly,  not  only  in  their  own 
interests,  but,  in  effect,  in  the  interests  of  the  com- 
munity."2 

1  Held   in   Washington   D.C..  October   28,  1902.      Printed   in  the 
American  Architect  for  November  22,  1902. 

2  See  Appendix,  p.  381. 


NEXT  STEPS  369 

For  that  trouble-breeding  portion  of  industry  here 
discussed,  the  joint-agreement  is  all  that  any  "solution" 
can  be;  namely,  the  next  best  practical  step  toward 
a  rational  industrial  method.  These  agreements  are 
not  of  universal  application.  They  apply  at  points 
where  unionism  is  inevitable ;  where  the  wage  sys- 
tem is  under  such  strain  as  to  require  modification 
in  the  direction  of  a  more  democratized  manage- 
ment. Every  scheme  that  is  not  inherently  educa- 
tional is  worthless,  because  the  clash  of  the  trust  and 
the  trade  union  is  raising  new  issues  for  which  an 
enlarged  social  morality  is  necessary. 

I  have  seen  an  extremely  decorous  group  of  per- 
sons listening  unshocked  to  the  story  of  a  corporation 
which  had  for  years  systematically  debauched  the 
local  legislature  and  with  cool  deliberation  brought 
small  independent  firms  to  ruin.  It  was  said,  "  Oh, 
but  the  corporations  must  do  it  to  avoid  blackmail ; 
and  as  for  ruining  other  people's  business,  that  is 
only  the  law  of  progress."  When  this  same  company 
heard  an  architect  tell  of  the  slugging  of  a  non-union 
man,  there  was  an  instant  spasm  of  moral  exaspera- 
tion. For  a  perversity  of  unfairness  like  this,  the 
one  need  is  light  and  larger  experience.  The  embit- 
tered workman  is  often  as  fantastic  in  his  unfairness. 
The  story  of  a  "  heaved  brick  "  at  the  scab  shocks 
him  as  little  as  these  prosperous  diners  were  shocked 
by  the  greater  sins  of  the  corporation.  There  is 
little  hope  save  in  educational  processes  that  enlarge 
the  perspective  of  both. 

Among  educated  folk  generally,  there  is  thus  far 
apparently  no  hint  of  what  the  word  "scab"  symbolizes 
to  the  unionist.  I  write  no  word  of  defence  for  a 


37O  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

single  abuse  connected  with  it,  but  the  time  has  come 
when  some  honest  attempt  should  be  made  to  under- 
stand a  force  of  such  extraordinary  persistence  and 
prevalence.  Without  such  understanding,  we  can- 
not even  conceive  an  educational  plan,  to  free  this 
feeling  from  its  abuses. 

A  concrete  instance  will  give  more  light  than  an 
argument. 

During  one  of  the  strikes  I  had  a  guide  through 
the  collieries  below  Wilkesbarre.  I  found  him  in  a 
modest  cottage  for  which  he  had  paid,  in  nineteen 
years,  all  but  three  hundred  and  seventy-five  dollars. 
He  and  his  wife  had  made  a  garden.  Flowers  were 
abundant,  and  vines  had  been  trained  into  a  pretty 
arbor.  Here  six  children  had  been  born.  Here 
three  of  them  had  died.  If  associations  that  knit 
into  sensitive  tissue  every  deeper  human  experience 
influence  any  of  us,  they  are  not  likely  to  have  left 
unmoved  the  owners  of  this  simple  home. 

This  man  and  his  mates  had  struck.  They  asked 
that  their  grievances  be  considered  before  some  fair 
tribunal.  The  employers  refused  to  arbitrate,  but 
began  forthwith  to  bring  in  outside  labor  to  take  the 
place  of  the  strikers.  I  give  this  miner's  view  of  the 
situation,  not  as  a  final  answer  to  the  hard  question 
involved ;  I  give  it,  confident  that  no  answer  is  worth 
stating  which  does  not  carefully  take  his  view  into 
account.  "  We  asked  for  months,"  he  said,  "  that 
certain  conditions  under  which  we  work  be  changed. 
The  employers  would  not  listen  to  us,  and  we  struck. 
Now  while  we  are  simply  waiting  to  have  our  dispute 
fairly  settled,  they  bring  in  outside  men  and  take 
away  our  work.  I  was  brought  here  by  the  last 


NEXT   STEPS  371 

foreman  and  urged  by  the  company  to  buy  our  home. 
It  cost  us  years  of  saving.  Now  they  tell  me  to  get 
out  if  I  don't  like  the  work  here.  I  can't  get  out. 
This  is  my  home,  with  all  my  friends,  my  church,  my 
union.  There  is  no  other  industry  here  except  the 
railroads,  and  they  won't  look  at  a  man  fifty-four 
years  old." 

No  fair  person,  with  the  imagination  to  put  himself 
in  another's  place,  will  believe  that  the  letter  of  legal 
justice  meets  all  that  there  is  in  this  case.  Neither 
will  such  person  fail  to  understand  why  this  miner 
was  bitter  against  the  outside  workman  who  was 
willing  to  come  in  to  take  the  miner's  place  during 
the  dispute. 

In  this  special  strike,  who  was  this  outside  non- 
union man  (the  scab)  ?  Hundreds  of  them  were  men 
in  other  industries  steadily  at  work.  It  was  the  time 
when  republican  orators  were  saying  with  much 
truth,  "  Every  man  is  at  work."  These  men  were 
hired  for  a  better  wage  to  leave  their  work,  to  take 
the  job  of  another  who  was  for  a  time  asking  to  have 
his  demands  considered.  There  are  now  men  in  our 
cities  whose  business  it  is  to  hire  themselves  out  as 
"  strike  breakers."  Asking  no  questions  as  to  the 
right  or  wrong  of  the  strike,  they  are  ready  to  go 
hither  and  yon  to  take  the  places  of  other  men.  I 
have  seen  miners  who  had  learned  from  those  inside 
the  mine  that  those  who  had  taken  their  places  were 
brought  from  a  city  outside  the  coal  region  where 
they  were  regularly  employed.  It  is  a  terrible  strain 
upon  average  human  nature  to  look  upon  this  with 
the  coolness  and  self-restraint  of  the  disinterested  ob- 
server. In  spite  of  the  provocation,  personal  vio- 


3/2  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

lence  should  be  met  with  the  swiftest  stroke  consistent 
with  justice.  Scarcely  a  value  of  our  civilization  equals 
that  of  law  and  order.  But  the  real  rights  of  these 
miners  are  not  settled  in  this  instance,  after  the  law 
has  done  its  work. 

A  question  remains  which  is  not  yet  settled. 
Morally,  and  on  grounds  of  good  policy,  we  have 
still  to  meet  this  issue  of  the  non-union  man  in 
time  of  strike.  No  generalization  is  yet  possible,  but 
in  cases  like  the  above,  when  troops  of  men  have 
been  expressly  encouraged  by  the  company  to  buy 
their  houses,  non-union  men  should  not  be  brought  in 
to  break  the  strike  until  every  fair  resource  of  arbi- 
tration has  been  exhausted,  even  if  it  drives  us  to 
compulsory  arbitration.  To  refuse  arbitration,  and 
then  hire  private  retainers  of  the  Pinkerton  type, 
will  not  long  be  tolerated  by  a  fair  public.  The 
irritants  and  the  dangers  are  not  only  too  great, 
they  are  not  necessary.  The  joint-agreement  avoids 
them.  Under  its  provisions,  work  is  not  stopped 
until  the  forces  of  arbitration  have  done  their  work. 

We  repeat  the  phrase,  "  Oh,  if  the  trade  unions 
only  had  really  competent  leaders."  Let  us  learn 
another  phrase  that  is  quite  as  apt,  "  Oh,  if  the  great 
business  had  leaders  competent  enough  to  avoid  the 
unnecessary  sources  of  suspicion  and  bitterness 
among  their  workmen." 

A  wise  use  of  the  joint-agreement,  made  elastic 
and  practically  adapted  to  varying  conditions,  is  one 
long,  sure  step  toward  such  leadership,  and  toward 
the  common  educated  good  will  upon  which  industrial 
peace  depends. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

A   FINAL   QUESTION 

IT  has  been  shown  what  is  possible  with  labor  or- 
ganization when,  with  intelligence  and  open-minded- 
ness,  masters  and  men  unite  under  orderly  methods. 
We  have  finally  to  ask  in  what  spirit  another  dis- 
quieting presence  rising  in  our  midst  is  to  be  met 
We  may  save  ourselves  a  world  of  trouble  by  trying, 
first  of  all,  to  bring  to  bear  upon  socialism  enough 
intellectual  sympathy  to  understand  it.  Only  in  rare 
instances  have  our  business  men,  or  the  public  gen- 
erally, honestly  tried  to  know  what  the  immense 
sacrifices  behind  the  trade  union  really  mean.  At 
this  late  day,  because  of  compulsion  and  incon- 
venience, we  are  putting  forth  some  effort  to  under- 
stand the  industrial  struggle  for  existence  from  the 
point  of  view  of  labor  organization.  It  is  now  seen 
that  a  little  of  this  tardy  wisdom  could  have  saved 
the  vast  waste  of  the  coal  strike  by  doing  in  the 
beginning  what  public  opinion  compels  us  to  do 
many  months  afterward.  The  joint-agreement  of  the 
Boston  Building  Trades  would  not  only  have  saved 
New  York  and  Chicago  inconceivable  sums,  but 
would  meantime  have  educated  both  parties  to  the 
contract  so  that  a  sea  of  future  ills  could  be  avoided. 

The  opportunity  is  given  us  to  be  wiser  with  the 
coming  socialism  than  we  have  proved  ourselves  with 

373 


3/4  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

trade  unions.  The  German  and  much  more  the 
Belgian  experience  which  has  been  given,  show  us 
that  socialism  has  now  developed  so  that  an  educa- 
tional cooperation  with  it  is  possible.  We  cannot  at 
present  have  the  Belgian  cooperative.  For  a  con- 
siderable future  our  battle  will  be  in  cities  and  with 
public-service  corporations.  For  the  highest  educa- 
tional purposes  this  gives  us  every  advantage  that  we 
need.  Thus  the  final  question,  as  distinctly  moral 
as  it  is  one  of  self-interest,  I  conceive  to  be  this: 
Are  we  as  a  people  willing  to  put  in  practice  those 
methods  which  increase  this  educational  cooperation  ? 
I  have  given  much  evidence  to  show  that  the  trade 
union,  socialism,  and  business  management,  taken 
at  their  best,  are  now  so  far  in  touch,  that  a  common 
working  basis  of  industrial  and  administrative  experi- 
ment is  at  least  possible.  It  is  through  these 
experiments  that  our  best  discipline  is  to  come. 
There  are  splendid  hopes  for  a  well-ordered  industrial 
society  if  we  are  brave  enough  and  generous  enough 
to  recognize  these  possibilities  of  agreement  and  to 
use  them  educationally. 

On  the  need  of  industrial  reconstruction ;  on  the  de- 
fects of  the  wage  system ;  on  the  abuses  of  the  trade 
union  as  well  as  of  the  trust ;  on  the  need  of  extend- 
ing legal  regulation,  there  is  now  a  very  remarkable 
consensus  of  opinion  among  able  writers,  economists, 
business  men,  labor  leaders,  and  socialists  trained 
by  experience.  This  general  acquiescence  does  not, 
of  course,  extend  to  details  or  to  methods.  It  gives 
us,  nevertheless,  so  broad  a  ground  of  common  sym- 
pathy and  understanding,  that  it  should  be  made  the 
basis  of  a  new  educational  and  experimental  activity. 


A   FINAL  QUESTION  3/5 

When  one  of  the  strongest  of  the  coal  operators 
admits  (see  p.  32)  that  there  is  no  hope  except  in  a 
frank  recognition  of  the  unions  and  the  consequent 
common  education  that  would  follow,  that  kind  of 
employer  should  be  brought  into  relation  with  labor 
men  who,  for  the  same  reason,  are  asking  recognition. 
Employer  and  employed  here  speak  the  language  of 
a  common  experience. 

When  a  first-rate  railroad  president  of  large  ex- 
perience with  labor  says  (see  p.  33)  that  in  these 
days  a  man  who  is  not  strong  enough  to  work  with 
labor  organizations  is  not  strong  enough  for  his  posi- 
tion, we  wish  to  add  him  to  the  group.  When  the 
head  of  a  very  successful  corporation  (see  p.  195) 
says  that  in  large  concerns  like  his  own,  not  only 
the  trade  union  but  the  spirit  of  partnership  should 
be  recognized,  we  add  him  to  this  new  fellowship. 
It  is  very  common  to  hear  this  type  of  business  man 
admit  that  in  large  affairs  the  arbitrary,  traditional 
expressions,  "my  business,"  "take  it  or  leave  it,"  "I 
will  manage  it  as  I  like,"  are  soon  likely  to  be  classed 
properly  with  the  elder  Vanderbilt's  "  the  public  be 
damned."  These  business  men  of  larger  outlook  are 
increasing  precisely  as  a  safer  and  more  conservative 
type  of  labor  leader  is  increasing.  Every  device 
which  brings  these  and  those  like  them  together,  has 
in  it  the  binding  and  educational  influence  that  alone 
makes  for  social  safety. 

As  the  socialist  makes  his  appearance  —  as  he  soon 
enough  will  —  among  our  mayors  and  town  council- 
lors, he  should  be  met  in  the  same  spirit.  As  in  the 
case  of  the  trade  union,  we  should  welcome  the  joint- 
agreement  for  the  teaching  power  that  is  in  it,  so 


376  THE   SOCIAL   UNREST 

socialism  should  be  taken  at  its  word.  Once  in  office, 
it  should  have  safe  tether  for  practical  experiment. 

The  socialist  asks  for  a  profound  social  reconstruc- 
tion to  the  end  that  a  new  justice  and  a  new  brother- 
hood may  obtain  among  men.  The  admissions  that 
much  of  this  criticism  is  just;  that  much  of  this 
organization  is  necessary  and  right,  are  from  success- 
ful men  of  affairs  who  have  the  gift  and  the  courage 
to  take  the  social  point  of  view  rather  than  judge  so 
vast  a  question  from  the  ground  of  immediate  private 
interest. 

As  we  bring  these  disinterested  admissions  face  to 
face  with  socialist  criticism,  when  it  also  has  learned 
to  take  the  social  point  of  view,  we  stand  not  in 
sharply  divided  and  hostile  camps,  but  on  a  common 
ground  where  men  of  good  will  can  work  together. 

For  example,  between  the  older  socialist,  who  be- 
lieved that  the  wage  system  held  the  whole  labor 
world  on  the  margin  of  bare  subsistence,  depriving 
him  of  every  hope  of  advance,  and  the  individualist 
who  has  nothing  but  praise  for  the  wage  system,  there 
is  no  ground  for  reconciliation.  But  if  the  individ- 
ualist has  come  to  see  the  imperfections  of  this  rela- 
tion between  employer  and  employed,  and  the  socialist 
has  come  to  recognize  what  the  wage  system  has 
actually  accomplished,  there  is  at  once  room  for  sym- 
pathy and  cooperation.  My  claim  is  that  precisely  this 
is  being  brought  about.  Such  a  possible  sympathetic 
understanding  already  exists  upon  the  most  essential 
points  in  dispute,  if  we  select  in  each  of  the  opposing 
groups  the  most  socially  developed  intelligence. 

A  man  who  has  managed  with  brilliant  success, 
for  many  years,  from  one  to  five  thousand  men, 


A   FINAL   QUESTION  377 

tells  me  that  the  day  is  near  at  hand  when  the 
present  methods  of  wage  payment  must  undergo 
very  radical  changes ;  that  it  is  too  inelastic  to  meet 
the  new  conditions  of  industry ;  that  it  results  in 
enormous  waste  through  strikes ;  that  the  old  idea 
of  contract  needs  modification.  He  does  not  profess 
to  know  how  these  changes  are  to  be  brought  about, 
but  thinks  it  is  likely  that  the  spread  of  industrial 
training  will  more  and  more  make  it  possible  to  admit 
groups  of  workmen  into  a  practical  partnership  in  the 
business.  He  affirms  that  a  good  deal  of  business,  that 
is  most  vital  to  the  whole  public,  has  already  reached 
a  stage  in  which  the  business  ideas  upon  which  he 
was  brought  up  seem  to  have  no  place.  Now  I  am 
certain  that  if  this  man  were  to  spend  an  evening 
with  socialists  like  Von  Vollmar,  Bernstein,  Miller- 
and,  Anseele,  and  Professor  Hector  Denis,  he  would 
find  so  much  in  common  that  he  would  not  think  of 
them,  or  they  of  him,  as  separated  by  an  impassable 
gulf.  He  would  not  think  of  them  as  moving  east 
while  he  was  moving  west.  His  own  admission  about 
the  defects  of  the  wage  system  would  bring  them 
near  enough,  not  only  to  understand  each  other,  but 
to  see  that  some  measure  of  practical  cooperation 
would  be  easily  possible.  These  socialists  have 
learned  as  much  that  is  favorable  to  a  long-continued 
use  of  the  wage  system  as  this  business  man  has 
learned  of  its  defects. 

A  Belgian  socialist,  after  some  years'  experience 
in  managing  a  cooperative  bakery,  told  me :  "  I  was 
taught  to  believe  that  payment  by  wages  was  the 
deadly  economic  sin,  but  I  don't  see  how  we  can  ever 
do  anything  but  modify  it  a  good  deal.  If  business 


3/8  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

is  highly  organized,  we  shall  continue  to  pay  some- 
thing very  like  wages.  We  shall  continue  to  employ 
a  class  of  middlemen  that  I  used  to  think  unpro- 
ductive, because  they  did  not  actually  make  things. 
But  to  get  products  where  people  want  them  is  just 
as  necessary  as  to  make  them,  and  those  who  do  this 
have  to  be  paid."  I  should  go  far  to  listen  to  a  dis- 
cussion between  this  socialist  and  the  business  man 
just  quoted  on  the  changes  in  the  wage  system,  which 
both  admitted  to  be  desirable.  Each  would  have 
understood  the  other's  speech ;  each  appreciated  the 
other's  difficulties. 

Twenty  years  of  hard  work  under  responsibilities 
has  brought  socialism  to  the  point  where  it  may  be 
cooperated  with  in  ways  that  educate  and  at 
the  same  time  furnish  the  very  evidence  we  need 
as  to  the  superiority  or  inferiority  of  its  meth- 
ods. The  first  demand  of  the  socialist  mayor  or 
town  council  is  to  set  aside  the  contractor  and  build 
the  schoolhouse  or  the  sewer  directly  by  the  city 
employees.  This  represents  in  theory  a  step  in  the 
socializing  of  profits.  If  they  should  succeed  in  this, 
the  community  gains.  If,  by  doing  poorer  or  costlier 
work,  they  fail,  the  failure  goes  down  at  once  to 
their  discredit. 

A  people  as  fearless  and  as  careless  of  tradition  as 
we  claim  to  be,  should  welcome  the  occasion  to  say : 
"You  socialists  condemn  our  private  profit-making 
regime.  It  is  true  we  have  made  poor  work  in 
managing  our  cities.  There  has  been  extravagance 
and  corruption.  You  come  with  promises  to  improve 
upon  this.  You  shall  have  a  perfectly  fair  chance 
to  put  your  methods  on  trial  before  the  community. 


A   FINAL  QUESTION  379 

You  shall  do  enough  city  work  without  the  profit- 
maker  to  furnish  your  own  evidence.  If,  in  expense 
or  in  excellence,  you  can  serve  the  city  better,  the 
credit  shall  be  yours.  To  prove  that  the  contractor 
is  a  useless  burden  to  the  taxpayer,  will  bring  you 
new  votes. 

From  a  confidence  like  this,  no  social  interest  could 
suffer.  It  throws  upon  the  collectivist  innovators  a 
burden  of  work  so  serious  that  its  educational  influ- 
ence acts  with  automatic  directness.  Under  this 
responsibility  of  doing  things,  they  learn  the  sound- 
est lessons  upon  the  very  points  where  ignorance  is  a 
social  and  industrial  danger.  Day  by  day,  made  ac- 
countable for  results,  they  learn  the  value  and  place  of 
new  machinery ;  they  learn  prudence  in  lowering  the 
hours  of  labor ;  they  learn  the  risks  of  limiting  their 
output,  and  the  necessity  of  applying  the  minimum 
wage  with  business  caution ;  they  learn  why  the  "uni- 
versal strike  "  is  a  folly  and  why  the  wage  system  is 
still  of  service  ;  they  learn  that  cooperative  substitutes 
must  come  gradually  and  prove  their  superiority  step 
by  step.  Best  of  all,  they  learn  that  the  Mecca  of 
the  cooperative  commonwealth  is  not  to  be  reached 
by  setting  class  against  class,  but  by  bearing  common 
burdens  through  toilsome  stages,  along  which  all  who 
wish  well  to  their  fellows  can  journey  together. 

The  noblest  word  that  I  have  ever  heard  from  any 
cooperator  was  this  :  "  You  cannot  make  this  more 
democratic  business  work,  without  calling  on  more 
and  more  people  to  help  you.  If  it  should  ever 
conquer  the  hand-to-hand  fight  of  competition,  then 
everybody,  whether  they  wanted  to  or  not,  would 
have  to  help  everybody  else." 


380  THE  SOCIAL  UNREST 

The  habits  which  gain  strength  from  this  conscious- 
ness of  mutual  aid  would  give  to  labor  the  serenity 
and  delight  which  it  has  too  rarely  known. 

This  dream  of  a  day  when  life's  work  —  even  the 
drudgery  and  the  routine  —  may  be  done  with  the 
ennobling  sense  that  every  energy  of  hand  and  brain 
helps  the  many  as  it  helps  the  doer,  has  in  it  the  most 
sustaining  of  all  enthusiasms. 

To  work  slowly  and  painfully  toward  this  end  is  a 
possibility  that  need  not  be  deferred.  The  sacrifices 
that  it  requires  are  the  surrender  of  many  things  that 
are  now  our  vexation  and  our  curse.  Some  aban- 
donment there  would  have  to  be  of  a  stiff  and  con- 
temptible class  pride ;  much  yielding  of  domineering 
temper ;  some  shattering  of  idols  where  doting  wor- 
shippers pay  homage  to  the  meanest  symbols  of 
social  inequality.  We  shall  survive  even  these  depri- 
vations. They  are  losses  which  make  no  man  poorer, 
but  rather  add  to  the  riches  of  us  all. 


APPENDIX 

A  SINGLE  illustration  of  a  trade-agreement  is  here 
given  to  show  its  exact  character  in  one  industry. 

It  is  this  type  of  joint  organization  which  was  con- 
sidered in  great  detail  by  employer  and  employed  at 
the  recent  meeting  of  the  Civic  Federation  in  New 
York,  December  8,  9,  and  10. 

From  seven  different  industries  the  testimony  by 
masters  and  men  was  overwhelming  as  to  its  ef- 
fectiveness. 

The  following  is  the  last  joint  agreement  of  THE 
JOINT  COMMITTEE  of  THE  MASTER  CARPENTERS'  ASSO- 
CIATION OF  THE  CITY  OF  BOSTON  and  THE  UNITED 
CARPENTERS'  COUNCIL  OF  THE  CITY  OF  BOSTON  AND 
VICINITY,  created  under  agreement  of  the  two  bodies 
to  settle  all  questions  of  mutual  concern  to  employers 
and  workmen  in  that  trade,  without  strikes  or  lock- 
outs, and  have  decided  upon  the  following 

WORKING  RULES 

to  govern  employers  and  workmen  in  that  trade  for 
the  term  ending  May  i,  1904,  acting  under  the  fol- 
lowing 

DECLARATION  OF  PRINCIPLES 

In  carrying  out  these  rules  the  parties  thereto,  that 
is  to  say  the  members  of  the  Master  Carpenters'  Asso- 
ciation of  the  City  of  Boston  and  the  members  of  the 

381 


382  APPENDIX 

United  Carpenters'  Council  of  the  City  of  Boston  and 
Vicinity,  are  to  sustain  the  principle  that  absolute  per- 
sonal independence  of  the  individual  to  work  or  not  to 
work,  to  employ  or  not  to  employ,  is  fundamental, 
and  should  never  be  questioned  or  assailed,  for  upon 
that  independence  the  security  of  our  whole  social 
fabric  and  business  prosperity  rests,  and  employers 
and  workmen  should  be  equally  interested  in  its 
defence  and  preservation.  Inasmuch  as  the  United 
Carpenters'  Council  is  now  being  recognized  as  a 
proper  body  to  cooperate  with  in  settling  all  matters 
of  mutual  concern  between  employers  and  workmen 
in  this  trade,  it  shall  be  understood  that  the  policy  of 
The  Master  Carpenters'  Association  shall  be  to  assist 
the  said  Council  and  its  constituent  Unions  to  make 
their  bodies  as  thoroughly  representative  as  possible. 


WORKING   RULES 

1.  Hours  of  Labor. 

From  May  i,  1903,  to  May  I,  1904,  not  more 
than  eight  hours'  labor  shall  be  required  in  the 
limits  of  the  day,  except  it  be  as  over-time,  with 
payment  for  same  as  herein  provided,  except  in 
shops,  where  the  time  shall  be  nine  hours. 

2.  Working  Hours. 

The  working  hours  to  be  from  8  A.M.  to  12  M., 
and  from  i  P.M.  to  5  P.M.,  with  one  hour  for  dinner, 
during  the  months  of  February,  March,  April,  May, 
June,  July,  August,  September,  October.  During 
the  months  of  November,  December,  and  January 
each  employer  and  his  employees  shall  be  free  to 


APPENDIX  383 

decide  as  to  the  hours  of  beginning  and  quitting 
work,  always  with  the  understanding  that  not  more 
than  eight  hours  shall  be  required,  except  as  over- 
time, as  herein  provided  for. 

3.  Night  Work. 

Eight  hours  to  constitute  a  night's  labor.  When 
two  gangs  are  employed,  working  hours  to  be  from 
8  P.M.  to  12  M.,  and  from  i  A.M.  to  5  A.M. 

4.  Over-time. 

Over-time  to  be  paid  for  as  time  and  one-half. 

5.  Double  Time. 

Work  done  on  Sundays,  Fourth  of  July,  Labor 
Day,  Thanksgiving  and  Christmas  days  to  be  paid 
for  as  double  time. 

6.  Wages. 

From  date  of  this  agreement  to  May  I,  1903, 
the  minimum  rate  of  wages  to  be  35  cents  per 
hour.  From  May  i,  1903,  to  May  I,  1904,  the 
minimum  rate  of  wages  to  be  3/|  cents  per  hour. 

7.  Pay  Day. 

Wages  to  be  paid  weekly  at  or  before  5  P.M.  of 
the  established  pay  day  of  each  employer. 

8.  Waiting  Time. 

If  any  workman  is  discharged,  he  shall  be  entitled 
to  receive  his  wages  at  once,  and  failing  to  so 
receive  them,  he  shall  be  entitled  to  payment  at 
regular  rate  of  wages,  for  every  working  hour  of 
waiting  time  which  he  may  suffer  by  default  of  the 
employer.  If  any  workman  is  laid  off  on  account 


384  APPENDIX 

of  unfavorable  weather,  he  shall  not  be  entitled  to 
waiting  time.  If  any  workman  is  laid  off  on 
account  of  lack  of  materials,  he  shall  be  entitled  to 
receive  pay  for  every  working  hour  at  the  regular 
rate  of  wages  until  notified  that  work  must  be  tem- 
porarily suspended,  and  in  that  event  he  shall  be 
entitled,  on  demand,  to  receive  his  wages  at  once, 
the  same  as  in  case  of  discharge.  Should  an  office 
order  be  issued  to  a  workman  in  payment  of  his 
wages,  the  workman  shall  be  entitled  to  additional 
time  sufficient  to  enable  him  to  reach  the  office  to 
receive  payment. 

9.   Business  Agent. 

The  Business  Agent  of  the  Carpenters'  Union 
shall  be  allowed  to  visit  all  jobs  during  working 
hours  to  interview  the  Steward  of  the  job,  and  for 
this  purpose  only.  Nothing  in  this  Rule  shall  be 
construed  as  giving  such  Agents  any  authority  to 
issue  orders  controlling  the  work  of  workmen,  or  to 
interfere  with  the  conduct  of  the  work,  and  any 
infringement  of  this  Rule  shall  make  the  Agent  so 
infringing  liable  to  discipline  after  investigation. 


Ability,  restriction  of,  by  trade  unions, 
7 ;  question  of  extra  payment  of, 

333-337- 

Accidents,  indemnification  for  indus- 
trial, 49-50,  208-221 ;  relation  of, 
to  machinery,  209-213. 

Adams,  Henry  C.,  quoted,  76,  77,  80, 
166. 

Age  of  workmen  in  factories,  201-202. 

Agriculture,  failure  of  Marx's  thesis 
as  applied  to,  306-308. 

Alabama,  child  labor  in,  27,  29,  254. 

Ames,  Fisher,.76,  79. 

Anarchists,  artists  posing  as  social- 
ists really  are,  273. 

Andros,  Sir  Edmund,  73. 

Anseele,  Edouard,  314-315,  377. 

Antwerp,  International  Congress  at, 
in  interests  of  small  traders,  323. 

"Application  of  Socialism  to  Par- 
ticular Problems,"  cited,  278. 

Apprentices,  limitation  of,  4-5. 

"  Arbeiter  Frage,  Die,"  Lange's,  155. 

Arbitration,  necessity  for,  shown  by 
coal  strike  of  1902,  20-21. 

Aristocracy,  Jefferson's  natural,  244- 

24S- 

Arnold,  Matthew,  on  social  inequal- 
ity, 160. 

Arnold,  Thomas,  quoted,  160. 

Art,  for  working  people  in  Belgium, 
319;  socialistic  views  about,  320. 

Asquith,  Herbert,  on  laws  concern- 
ing industrial  accidents,  214. 

Atheism,  of  older  German  socialists, 
302;  later  modification  of  views 
concerning,  303-305. 

Australia,  compulsory  arbitration  in, 
41 ;  social  legislation  in,  104;  pol- 


icy in,  of  using  railroads,  tele- 
graphs, etc.,  first  for  social  service, 
221,  275-276;  social  colonies  in, 
241. 

Austria,  legislation  concerning  in- 
dustrial accidents  in,  213. 

Aveling,  Dr.,  302. 

B 

Bacon,  Francis,  259. 

Bacon's  Rebellion,  an  example  of 
early  discontent,  72. 

Bakeries,  cooperative,  in  Belgium, 
314-315,  317-318,  328. 

Barnett,  Canon,  on  the  social  ques- 
tion, 166. 

Bars,  private,  in  coal  fields,  12-13. 

Barton,  Sir  Edmund,  quoted,  41. 

Bebel,  241  n.,  299,  302,  303,  309. 

Beer  boys,  250. 

Belgium,  government  interference  in 
industrial  affairs  in,  52;  socialism 
in,  56,  57-59,  289,  313-343- 

Bellamy,  Edward,  136,  230-232,  240- 
241,  299. 

Benton,  Thomas  H.,  on  land  grants 
to  railroads,  114-115. 

Berkeley,  Governor,  72-73. 

Berlin,  high  death-rate  in,  due  to 
overcrowding,  247. 

Bernstein,  309,  377. 

Bishop  of  Durham  quoted  by  labor 
editors,  167. 

Bismarck,  Prince,  on  social  democ- 
racy, 287 ;  effect  of  fall  of,  on 
social  democracy,  311. 

Blacklist,  the,  35. 

Bon  Marche,  cooperative  method  in 
the,  350-351. 

Boston,  legal  checks  on  sweating  in, 


2  C 


385 


386 


INDEX 


29 ;  early  labor  discussions  in,  84- 

85- 
Boston  and  Maine  Railroad  and  New 

Hampshire  politics,  57. 
Boston  Building  Trades,  working  of 

joint-agreement  in  the,  367-368. 
Boycott,   the,    35 ;    use   of,    in   early 

strikes,  86 ;  one  weakness  of  trade 

unions,  356. 

Brace,  Charles  Loring,  quoted,  87. 
Breaker  boys,  18,  256. 
Brewery,  a  cooperative,  at  Joliment, 

3!9. 

Brockton,  socialism  in,  64-65 ;  strike 

of  lasters'  union  at,  192. 
Brousse,  346. 
Brussels,    cooperative   bakeries    in, 

3i7- 

Bryan,  W.  J.,  79. 
Burns,  John,  107. 


Cabot,  George,  76. 

Cahoon,  J.  B.,  on  state  regulation  of 
semi-public  industries,  125. 

Cairns,  Professor,  quoted,  162. 

California,  subserviency  of,  to  rail- 
roads, 47. 

Campanella,  Tommaso,  259. 

"  Canons  of  Etiquette,"  Jefferson's, 
228. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  51  n.,  159. 

Carnegie,  Andrew,  quoted  on  trade 
unions,  37  ;  on  speculation  versus 
legitimate  business,  276-277. 

"  Case  against  Child  Labor,  The," 
Murphy's,  254. 

Cass,  Lewis,  115. 

Catholics,  lower  ratios  of  insanity 
and  suicide  among,  than  among 
protestants,  97  n.;  opposition  of, 
to  socialists  in  Belgium,  322. 

Chamberlain,  Joseph,  214. 

Chance,  the  demand  for  equality  of, 
244-245. 

Channing,  W.  E.,  sermon  by,  quoted, 
80-8 1. 

Charity,  socialism  and,  in  France, 
291-294. 

Chase,  Mayor,  of  Haverhill,  65-66. 


Chase,  Salmon  P.,  quoted,  77. 

Chevalier,  Michel,  85. 

Chicago,  characteristics  of  trade 
unionism  in,  361. 

Child  labor,  27-28,  29,  207-208,  252- 
256. 

Civic  Federation,  the,  51. 

Clark,  Chief  Justice  (of  Tasmania), 
270  n. 

Clay,  Henry,  on  land  grants  to  rail- 
roads, 113-114. 

Club-houses  for  working  people  in 
Belgium,  316-317. 

Coal  mining  in  Belgium,  313. 

Colonies,  experiments  in  social,  228- 
234,  236-237 ;  in  Australia,  241 ; 
uselessness  of,  recognized,  257. 

Combinations  of  coal-mine  operators, 
19-20. 

Communism,  J.  S.  Mill  on,  165 ;  the 
literal  interpretation  of  equality, 
241-243;  private  property  de- 
stroyed outright  by,  279. 

Community  of  Equality,  Owen's, 
228-229. 

"  Condition  of  the  Working  Class  in 
England  in  1844,"  Engles's,  51  n. 

Consumers'  League,  the,  252. 

Consumptives  in  New  York  tenement 
houses,  251-252. 

Cooperation  in  America,  causes  of 
failure  of,  2-3. 

Cooperatives,  Belgian,  317-319;  oppo- 
sition of  small  traders  to,  323; 
commission  for  taking  evidence 
against,  324. 

Cordwainers,  strike  of,  in  Philadel- 
phia (1805),  86. 

Cotton  gin  as  illustrating  benefits  of 
machinery,  177-178. 

Courts,  trade-union  suspicion  of,  34- 
35,  41-42. 

Craft,  John,  254  n. 

Crank,  one  definition  of,  89. 

Creameries,  federation  of  Belgian 
cooperative,  321. 

D 

Debate  between  priest  and  socialist 
on  disarmament,  296. 


INDEX 


387 


Debt,  imprisonment  for,  86-87  '<  cases 
of  destitution  traceable  to,  248. 

Denis,  Hector,  346,  377 ;  concerning 
Belgian  socialist  party,  326. 

Denmark,  legislation  concerning  in- 
dustrial accidents  in,  213. 

Department  stores,  268-269. 

Deschanel,  54. 

De  Vogue,  55 ;  quoted,  167  n. 

Dicey,  Edward,  56,  60. 

"  Die  Frau,"  Bebel's,  quoted,  299. 

Dietzgen,  300,  302,  303. 

Disarmament  urged  by  French  so- 
cialists, 295-296. 

Discontent,  the  origin  of  the  social 
question,  68-69;  early  examples 
of,  72-85 ;  rise  in  standard  of  liv- 
ing a  cause  of,  93-96 ;  education 
as  a  cause  of,  96-97 ;  in  Germany, 
98-100;  politics  as  an  outlet  for 
modern,  105-106. 

Dole,  Charles  F.,  quoted,  100  n. 

"  Domestic  Service,"  Salmon's,  109- 
110. 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  on  land  grants 
to  railroads,  115. 

Drink  traffic,  municipalization  of, 
278. 

Drinking,  formation  of  habits  of, 
250-251. 

Dwight,  President  Timothy,  80. 

E 

"  Earthly  Paradise,"  Morris's,  quoted, 
170. 

Education,  critical  discontent  with, 
at  present,  70 ;  as  a  cause  of  dis- 
content, 96-97 ;  necessity  of,  for 
social  betterment,  347-349;  the 
kind  of,  needed,  350-352. 

Eliot,  President,  35. 

Ely,  Richard  T.,  118-119. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  use  of,  in 
labor  literature,  160;  on  ma- 
chinery, 170,  172. 

England,  trade  unionism  in,  3;  fac- 
tory legislation  in,  27,  29,  30,  50- 
51,  255 ;  legislation  in,  concerning 
industrial  accidents,  213,  216. 

Engles,  51  n.,  302,  310,  346. 


Equality,  the  desire  for,  222-225 ;  Jef- 
ferson's effort  for  social,  227-228 ; 
Owen's  experiment  in,  228-229; 
communism  the  literal  interpreta- 
tion of,  241-243;  of  opportunity 
real  object  of  socialists,  244-245. 

Experience,  American  disregard  for 
lessons  of,  24-25. 


Fabians,  the  English,  269,  273,  340; 
municipalization  of  drink  traffic 
demanded  by,  278. 

Factory  legislation,  28-29,  4-6,  207- 
208 ;  in  England,  255 ;  approved 
by  social  democrats,  311-312. 

Farm,  argument  by  German  socialists 
over  "  the  big,"  306-307. 

Farmers,  feeling  among,  concerning 
the  "money  power,"  133-140;  dis- 
content of,  really  due  to  monopoly 
privilege,  142-143 ;  German  so- 
cialists and  the,  306-308. 

Farmers'  Alliance,  the,  132-133. 

Farmers'  organizations,  131 ;  politics 
in,  131-133;  errors  of,  due  to 
ignorance  of  real  issues,  141-142. 

Farms,  deplorable  influence  of  large 
Western,  on  country  life,  188-189 ! 
cooperative,  in  Belgium,  317,  321, 

32S. 

Federation  of  Labor,  the,  346,  357. 

Ferri,  346. 

Fiske,  John,  quoted  by  socialist 
speakers,  165-166. 

Foreigners,  in  trade  unions,  3 ;  lead- 
ership of,  in  trade  unions,  3 ;  as  coal 
miners,  20;  effect  of,  on  wages, 
48,  344 ;  encouragement  given,  to 
come  to  the  United  States,  354; 
responsibilities  incurred  by  en- 
couraging, 354-355. 

Forests,  socialist  views  of,  277. 

Fourier,  the  Utopian  conception  of, 
260-261. 

France,  Le  Play  societies  in,  42 ;  gov- 
ernment interference  in  industrial 
affairs  in,  52-55 ;  legislation  con- 
cerning industrial  accidents  in, 
213, 216 ;  political  rise  of  socialism 


388 


INDEX 


in,  289;  socialist  experience  in 
municipalities  of,  291-294;  so- 
cialism in,  contrasted  with  that  in 
Belgium,  341  n. 


Gaston,  Judge  J.  B.,  254  n. 

George,  Henry,  84,  107, 108, 136,  222, 
267. 

Georgia,  child  labor  in,  27. 

Germany,  social  discontent  in,  98- 
100 ;  use  of  literature  by  industrial 
leaders  in,  155-159;  legislation 
concerning  industrial  accidents 
in,  213,  216-217;  sickness  and 
accident  insurance  statistics  in, 
249 ;  socialism  in,  289,  298-312. 

Ghent,   cooperative  bakery  in,  314- 

3i5- 

Gladden,  Dr.,  on  partnership  be- 
tween politicians  and  corporation 
managers,  150. 

Gladstone,  W.  E.,  59,  109 ;  cause  of 
tory  hatred  of,  223. 

Godin,  242,  260. 

Godwin,  William,  223. 

Gompers,  Samuel,  359. 

"  Gospel    of    Wealth,"    Carnegie's, 

37- 
Greeley,  Horace,  advice  of,  now  out 

of  date,  91. 

Grenoble,  socialist  restaurant  at,  289. 
Griswold,  Roger,  76. 
Guesde,  Jules,  288,  346. 
Guise,  Godin's  foundry  at,  242. 
Gunton,  George,  35. 

H 

Hadley,  President,  quoted  concern- 
ing separation  of  laborers  and 
capitalists,  93 ;  concerning  ma- 
chinery, 171 ;  on  machinery  and 
labor,  200  n. 

Hamilton,  Alexander,  76,  79. 

Harrison,  Frederic,  166,  348. 

Hatch,  A.  F.,  on  the  joint-agree- 
ment, 361. 

Haverhill,  socialism  in,  64-65. 

Helvetius,  244. 

Herbert,  Auberon,  107. 


History,  indifference  of  Americans 
to  lessons  of,  24-25. 

"  History  of  the  Anthracite  Coal  In- 
dustry," Dr.  Robert's,  115. 

"  History  of  Materialism,"  Lange's, 

iSS-157-  304  n. 
"  History    of   the    United    States," 

Adams's,  quoted,  75,  76,  77. 
Hohenlohe,  Prince,  quoted,  99-100. 
Home  of  the  People,  Ghent,  315. 
Howells,  W.  D.,  166. 
Hugo,  Victor,  quoted,  159  n. 
Hyndman,  346. 

I 

Illinois  Central  Railroad,  land  grants 
to,  113-115. 

Imprisonment  for  debt,  86-88. 

Incorporation  of  trade  unions,  34, 
366-367. 

Increment,  the  unearned,  267. 

Indebtedness,  destitution  traceable 
to,  248. 

Individual,  J.  S.  Mill  on  liberty  of 
the,  165. 

Individuals,  wrong  in  ownership  of 
machinery  by,  169-170. 

Inequality,  American  passion  for, 
234-235  ;  biological  origin  of,  243. 

Injunction,  the,  not  a  modern  in- 
vention, 85-86. 

Injuries,  treatment  of  victims  of  in- 
dustrial, in  the  United  States,  49- 
50;  question  of  indemnification 
for,  208-221. 

Insurance,  accident,  208-221 ;  sick- 
ness and  accident,  in  Germany, 
249;  present-day  views  of  Ger- 
man socialists  concerning  state 
labor,  311;  old-age,  in  Belgium, 
318 ;  Vooruit  system  of,  in  Ghent, 
328. 

Interference,  so-called,  of  trade 
unions,  38-39. 

Interstate  Commerce  Commission, 
comparative  helplessness  of,  281. 

Inventions,  attitude  of  trade  unions 
toward,  5-6;  unexpected  benefits 
derived  from,  173-174. 

Irish,  leadership  of,  in  trade  unions,  3. 


INDEX 


389 


Italy,  legislation  concerning  indus- 
trial accidents  in,  213. 

J 

Jackson,  Judge,  on  labor  unions,  34. 
James,  Henry,  misrepresentation  of 

socialist  character  by,  320. 
Japan,  the  so-called  awakening  of, 

69. 

Jaures,  290,  295,  296,  297,  346. 
Jefferson,  Thomas,  76,  79-80;  effort 

of,  after  social  equality,  227-228  ; 

on  the  "  natural  aristocracy,"  244- 

245- 

Jenks,  J.  W..  8  n. 
Joint-agreement,  the,  between    em- 

ployer and   employed,  2-3,  360- 

372;     operation     of,    in    Boston 

Building   Trades,   367-368;    text 

of  a,  381-384. 
Jones,  Thomas  G.,  254  n. 
Journals,   labor,  use   of  writings   of 

recognized    authorities    in,    160- 

168. 
Justice,     not     charity,     sought     by 

laborers,  205-207. 

K 

Kautsky,  241  n.,  244,  302,  346. 

Kidd,  Benjamin,  56. 

King,   Horatio,   on    land   grants    to 

railroads,  115. 
King,  Rufus,  76. 
Kingsley,  Charles,  51  n. 
Klassenkampf  in  Germany,  end  of, 

310-312. 
Knights  of  Labor,  133  ;   one  weak- 

ness of,  346. 
"  Kunst  und  die  Revolution,"  Wag- 

ner's, 157. 


Land,  grants  of,  to  railroads,   113- 

"5- 

Lange,  F.  A.,  155  ;  quoted,  156-157. 
Lassalle,  288,  310,  342,  346. 
Lasters,  strike  of,  at  Brockton,  192. 
Law,  necessity  of,  for  governing  some 

employers,  208. 
Legislation,    industrial,    41,    43-44  ; 


factory,  28-29,  4^,  207-208,  255, 
311-312;  on  drink  traffic,  278. 

Leo  III.,  Pope,  on  the  present  social 
state,  167. 

Le  Peuple,  organ  of  Belgian  social- 
ists, 316,  320,  331. 

Le  Seur,  Alexander,  228. 

Liberalism,  decay  of  political,  in 
Europe,  56-60. 

Libraries,  working  people's,  in  Bel- 
gium, 319. 

Liebknecht,  300,  303,  309,  310,  346. 

"  Life  of  Francis  Place,"  Wallace's, 
247  n. 

Lighting,  public  control  of,  119-120, 
270. 

Lille,  socialist  experiment  at,  290. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  on  the  equality 
of  man,  224-225. 

Literature,  on  social  questions,  great 
increase  of,  124  ;  ignorance  of 
business  men  of  trade-union,  144- 
147  ;  socialist,  in  Germany,  155- 
159 ;  European,  on  social  matters, 
160-168. 

"  Looking  Backward,"  Bellamy's, 
230-232,  240-241. 

Loubet,  President,  53  n. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  26,  166. 

M 

Macdonald,  Gordon,  254  n. 

Machinery,  trade  unions  and,  6,  35- 
36,  190-199;  Professor  Smart  on 
results  of  invention  of,  161-162; 
ownership  of,  should  be  by  the 
people  according  to  socialists, 
169-170 ;  various  writers  concern- 
ing, 170-172;  virtues  connected 
with,  173-178 ;  no  displacement  of 
labor  by,  but  the  contrary,  179- 
182;  effect  of,  on  wages,  182-184; 
sometimes  an  evil,  186-188 ;  effect 
of  use  of,  on  Western  farms,  188- 
189 ;  indemnification  for  injuries 
due  to,  208-221 ;  proposals  of 
socialism  concerning  evils  due  to, 
220-221 ;  as  viewed  by  Belgian 
socialists,  328  ;  trade  unions  grow- 
ing more  friendly  to,  356. 


390 


INDEX 


Maclure,  William,  228. 

McMaster,  John  Bach,  quoted,  74- 
75,  82-84,  88. 

McNeil,  George  E.,  35. 

Maison  du  Peuple,  the,  315-317. 

Mallock,  W.  H.,  244,  334. 

Malon,  244,  304. 

Marshall,  Professor,  247  n. 

Marx,  Karl,  8-9,  51  n.,  263,  288,  301, 
304,  305,  308,  310,  346. 

Massachusetts,  factory  legislation  in, 
29 ;  socialist  mayors  in,  64-65 ; 
strikes  in  (1834),  85;  the  mini- 
mum wage  applied  in,  330. 

Mather,  Increase,  73. 

Maurice,  F.  D.,  239. 

Mellaerts,  Abbe,  credit  banks  intro- 
duced into  Belgium  by,  341. 

Middlemen,  elimination  of,  by  Bel- 
gian socialists,  314,  318,  321-322; 
a  class  of,  admitted  by  Belgian 
socialist  to  be  necessary,  378. 

Mill,  J.  S.,  extracts  from,  used  by 
labor  agitators,  164-165 ;  convic- 
tion of,  that  machinery  has  not 
lightened  labor,  171-172. 

Millerand,  53,  377;  in  Waldeck- 
Rousseau  ministry,  290-291. 

Miners,  working  of  joint-agreement 
among,  361-362. 

Mitchell,  John,  126 ;  plea  of,  for  law 
and  order  in  strikes,  149 ;  on  sym- 
pathetic strikes,  347;  on  educa- 
tion of  trade  unions  up  to  broader 
principles,  359. 

Mommsen,  Theodor,   quoted,   158- 

159. 

Money  power,  feeling  against  the, 
133-135;  importance  of  popular 
hostility  to,  139-142. 

Morley,  John,  59,  166. 

Mormons,  the,  233-234. 

Morris,  William,  166,  288 ;  on  ma- 
chinery, 170-171,  172;  aversion 
of,  to  Bellamy's  scheme,  241 ; 
more  anarchist  than  socialist, 

273- 

Murphy,  Edgar  Gardner,  254  n. 
Mutual  credit  associations,  Belgian, 

341- 


N 

Nasmith,  James,  on  effect  of  intro- 
duction of  machinery,  172-173. 

Negro,  effect  of  employment  of,  on 
wages,  28,  344. 

New  Hampshire,  connection  between 
railroads  and  politics  in,  57. 

New  Orleans,  opposition  in,  to  trade 
unions,  39  n. 

Newspapers,  limitations  of  benefits 
of,  172. 

New  Zealand,  social  regulations  in, 
30,  41,  104,  116,  221,  270,  274-275. 

North   Carolina,  labor  statistics  in, 

2S3-254- 

Norway,  legislation  concerning  in- 
dustrial accidents  in,  213;  legis- 
lation concerning  the  drink  traffic 
in,  278. 

O 

Opportunity,  demand  for  equality  of, 
244-245 ;  lack  of,  due  to  over- 
crowding, 247;  lack  of,  due  to 
indebtedness,  248  ;  lack  of,  due  to 
tenement-house  conditiqns,  251- 
252. 

Organization  of  business  interests 
and  of  labor,  present-day  neces- 
sity for,  30-32. 

Overcapitalization,  of  coal  com- 
panies, 23 ;  in  trusts,  6o~6i. 

Overcrowding,  degeneracy  resulting 
from,  247. 

Owen,  Robert,  255,  261-262,  326; 
Utopian  experiment  of,  228-229. 


Pace  setting  in  factories,  35,  36,  191- 

193- 
Partnership  between   employer  and 

laborer,  recognition  of,  195-196  ; 

non-recognition  of,  197-199. 
Paternalism  practised  by  capitalists, 

46-47. 
Patrons  of  Husbandry,  founding  of, 

131- 

Paulsen,  Professor,  99  n. 
Pawnshops,  municipal,  250. 
Pearson,  Professor,  55. 


INDEX 


391 


Peasants'  Revolt,  the,  70. 

Pennsylvania,  subserviency  of,  to 
railroads,  47. 

Pensions,  old-age,  50. 

Peoples  party,  the,  133,  141. 

Petite  Bourgeoisie,  La,  323  n. 

Philadelphia,  strike  of  cordwainers  in 
(1805)  ,86. 

Philanthropy,  dislike  of  wage  earners 
for,  203-205. 

Phillips,  Dr.  J.  H.,  254  n. 

Picard,  Senator,  320. 

Pickering,  Timothy,  76. 

Piece-work,  trade  unions  and,  6-7, 
35-36;  versus  time-work,  among 
Belgian  socialists,  330-331. 

Ploughs  as  illustrating  benefits  of 
machinery,  177. 

Politics,  railroads  and,  47, 57 ;  modern 
social  unrest  finds  an  outlet  in, 
105-106;  in  farmers'  organiza- 
tions, 131,  133 ;  in  England  de- 
termined by  business  and  com- 
merce, 262-265. 

Pollock,  Sir  Frederick,  on  laws  con- 
cerning industrial  accidents,  214. 

Poor,  socialist  help  of  the,  in  France, 
291-294. 

Populism  in  the  United  States,  58. 

Powder,  sale  of,  by  operators  to  coal 
miners,  13,  313. 

Press,  the,  as  a  means  of  expressing 
discontent,  90-91. 

"  Principles  of  Economics,"  Mar- 
shall's, quoted,  247  n. 

Printing  machinery,  no  displacement 
of  labor  by,  181. 

Profit  sharing,  40. 

Proudhon,    socialism     defined    by, 

259  n. 
Pryor,   Dr.  John    H.,   quoted,   251- 

252. 
Publicity,  demand  for,  in  semi-public 

businesses,  23-24. 
Pumpmen  in  coal  mines,  14. 
Pyfferoen,  Oscar,  323. 

Q 

Question,  the  woman,  97-98;  the 
social,  107-109,  112-125,  J43i  J44~ 


168  (see  Socialism) ;  the  servant, 
108-112. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  on  Thomas  Jeffer- 
son, 77. 


Railroads,  effect  of  control  of,  by 
coal-mine  operators,  19,  20-22; 
subserviency  of  Pennsylvania  and 
California  to,  47 ;  politics  and,  in 
New  Hampshire,  57 ;  government 
land  grants  to,  113-115;  farmers' 
organizations  and,  133 ;  influence 
of,  on  quality  of  men,  176 ;  acci- 
dents to  employees  on,  209-210; 
Interstate  Commerce  Commis- 
sion does  not  regulate,  281. 

Reeves,  W.  P.,  104. 

Reform,  the  Great,  in  England,  70. 

Regulation,  futile  efforts  at,  by  gov- 
ernment commissions,  281-283. 

Reiffeisen  Bank,  the,  341. 

Reilly,  A.  J.,  254. 

Religion,  as  a  factor  in  former  peri- 
ods of  unrest,  81 ;  decay  of  author- 
ity in,  a  source  of  unrest,  101-102 ; 
power  of,  in  Utopian  experiments, 
233-234 ;  "  ten  thousand  defini- 
tions "  of,  258 ;  and  German  social 
democracy,  302-305 ;  socialists 
and,  322. 

"  Religion  der  Socialdemokratie," 
Dietzgen's,  300. 

Remuneration  Conference  in  Lon- 
don, 347-349- 

Rent,  George's  theory  of,  267.  See 
George,  Henry. 

Restaurants,  socialist,  289. 

Rogers,  Thorold,  quoted,  161. 

Roosevelt,  President,  53. 

Rosebery,  Lord,  quoted,  59. 

Rouanet,  Gustave,  304  n. 

Roubaix,  slow  work  of  socialism  at, 
290. 

Rousseau,  Jean  Jacques,  223,  260. 

Ruskin,  John,  use  of,  in  labor  jour- 
nals, 161 ;  on  machinery,  170, 172, 
219. 

Ruskin,  Tennessee,  Utopian  experi- 
ment at,  233. 


392 


INDEX 


St.  Simon,  223.  259,  260. 

Salaries,  question  of,  in  proportion  to 

ability,  333-334. 
Salisbury,  Lord,  214. 
Salmon,  Professor,  109. 
Saloons  as  meeting  places  of  social 

agitators,  315-316. 
Say,  L6on,  53. 
Sayward,  W.  H.,  367-368. 
Scab,   the,  in   early  labor  troubles, 

85;    terrors   of,   disappear  under 

use  of  the  joint-agreement,  368; 

significance  of  the,  to  unionists, 

369-372. 

Schaeffle,  Dr.,  107,  157,  269,  339. 
Schall,  atheistic  statement  of,  302. 
Scherer,  Edmond,  55. 
School  attendance,  compulsory,  255, 

256. 
Schultze-Delitzsch,   the   town   credit 

banks  founded  by,  342. 
Schwab,    Charles    M.,    and    trade 

unions,   38 ;    concerning  care   of 

injured  employees,  206-207. 
Secretan,  Charles,  quoted,  160  n. 
Servant  question,  the,  109-112. 
Seward,  William  H.,  on  land  grants 

to  railroads,  114. 
Shakers,  the,  233-234. 
Sicily,  socialism  impossible  in,  262. 
"  Small    Business  Man,  The,"   Pyf- 

feroen's,  323. 

Smart,  Professor,  quoted,  161-162. 
Snobs,  examples  of  American,  234- 

235- 

Social  democrats,  Bismarck  on,  287 ; 
rise  of,  299 ;  leading  principles  of, 
299-302 ;  and  religion,  302-305 ; 
consideration  of  principles  of, 
305-307 ;  modification  of  views 
of,  308-312. 

Social  question,  what  is  meant  by, 
107-109;  cause  of  increase  of 
interest  in,  112-125;  economic 
significance  of,  143 ;  inevitable- 
ness  of,  144-168. 

Socialism,  education  in,  by  strike  of 
1902,  20-21 ;  in  France,  53-55, 
289-297,  341  n. ;  effect  of  trusts 


on,  60-61 ;  effect  of  enmity  be- 
tween capital  and  labor  on,  64- 
65 ;  in  Massachusetts  cities,  65 ; 
the  embodiment  of  present-day 
unrest,  106;  as  displayed  in  the 
farmers'  organizations,  133-136; 
proposals  of,  concerning  evils  due 
to  machinery,  220-221 ;  of  present 
day  is  not  communism,  242,  278- 
279 ;  definition  0^258-259 ;  history 
of,  260-265 1  illustrations  of  theory 
of,  265-286 ;  in  Germany,  298-312 ; 
in  Belgium,  313-341 ;  in  France 
and  in  Belgium  contrasted,  341  n. 

"Socialisme  en  Belgique,  Le,"339. 

"  Socialisme  Integral,  Le,"  Malon's, 
304- 

Socialists,  opposition  of  catholics  to, 
322. 

"  Social  Salvation,"  Dr.  Gladden's, 
quoted,  150. 

Sociology,  private  and  public  theories 
in,  7-9- 

Southern  Pacific,  California  and  the, 

47- 

Spahr,  Dr.,  tables  by,  showing  dis- 
tribution of  wealth,  163. 

Spain,  socialism  impossible  in,  262. 

Speculation,  dangers  of  rage  for,  78 ; 
early,  78-79;  versus  legitimate 
business,  276-277. 

Spencer,  Herbert,  26. 

Standard  of  living,  rise  in,  in  United 
States,  93-96 ;  in  Germany,  98-99. 

Steward,  Ira,  35. 

Stocks,  trade  in,  276-277. 

Stores,  cooperative,  in  America,  2-3 
(see  Cooperatives)  ;  company,  in 
coal  fields,  13,  313. 

Stove  manufactories,  working  of  joint- 
agreement  in,  361. 

Street  railway  franchises,  private 
ownership  of,  116,  120. 

"Street  Railway  Problem  in  Cleve- 
land, The,"  129. 

Street  railways,  growth  of  opinion 
among  employees  in  favor  of 
public  ownership  of,  127-130; 
and  department  stores,  268-269; 
public  control  of,  270. 


INDEX 


393 


Strike,  of  Philadelphia  cordwainers, 
86;  an  early  Roman,  89;  of 
lasters'  union  at  Brockton,  192. 

Strikes,  in  coal  industry,  17 ;  cost  of, 
paid  by  public,  22 ;  from  1830  to 
1838,  85;  growing  popular  sym- 
pathy in,  148-149;  sympathetic, 
condemned,  347,  359;  as  a  rule 
trade  unions  oppose,  356. 

Sumner,  Charles,  25. 

Sweating,  legal  checks  on,  in  Boston, 
29. 

Sweatshops,  dangers  in  clothing  from, 
251-252. 

Sweden,  legislation  on  drink  traffic 
in,  278. 

Switzerland,  factory  legislation  in,  29, 
30 ;  government  interference  in 
industrial  affairs  in,  52;  legisla- 
tion concerning  industrial  acci- 
dents in,  213,  216. 

Sympathy  with  strikers,  growth  of 
popular,  148-149. 


Telephones,  public  ownership  of, 
125  n.,  221,  275-276. 

Temperance,  influence  of  railroads 
on,  176;  advocated  by  Belgian 
socialists,  316-317. 

Theodor,  Leon,  324. 

"  Theology  of  Civilization,"  Dole's, 
quoted,  100. 

"Theory  of  the  Four  Movements," 
Fourier's,  260. 

Three  rents,  theory  of  the,  269-270. 

Tolstoi,  223. 

Tompkins,  Colonel  D.  A.,  labor  statis- 
tics by,  253. 

Tracy,  fudge,  76. 

Trade  unionism,  distinctive  features 
of  American,  3-4. 

Trade  unions,  limitation  of  appren- 
tices by,  4-5  ;  and  new  machinery, 
5-6.  35-30.  100-199;  and  piece- 
work, 6-7,  35-36 ;  a  retired  capi- 
talist quoted  concerning,  15;  in 
the  South,  28 ;  folly  of  not  recog- 
nizing, 32-33;  functions  of,  ac- 
cording to  employers,  37 ;  social- 


ist, in  France,  53-55;  capitalists' 
attitude  toward,  63-64 ;  growth 
among,  of  desire  for  municipal 
ownership  of  street  railways,  127- 
130 ;  literature  of,  145-147 ;  best 
men  not  leaders  in,  151 ;  unjust 
judgments  passed  on,  151-153 ; 
and  socialists,  345-346;  enemies 
to  revolutionary  opinions,  357- 
358. 

Trainmen  as  illustrating  benefits  of 
machinery,  175-176. 

Trusts,  a  capitalist  on  dangers  of, 
ii ;  effect  of,  on  politics,  60-61; 
responsibilities  of,  62-63. 

Tuberculosis,  the  distinctive  disease 
of  tenement-house  life,  251-252. 

U 

Unearned  increment,  the,  267. 

Unions.     See  Trade  unions. 

"  United  States  of  America,"  Chan- 
ning's,  quoted,  80. 

Unrest,  social,  early  examples  of, 
72-85;  in  Germany,  98-100;  de- 
cay of  authority  in  religion  a 
cause  of,  101-102 ;  politics  as  an 
outlet  for  modern,  105-106. 

Usury,  modern  cases  of,  248 ;  Belgian 
socialists'  methods  of  overcom- 
ing, 340-341. 

Utopias,  uselessness  of,  recognized, 
20,  257 ;  socialism  of  the,  44,  246 ; 
various  social  and  literary,  228- 
234,  236-237  ;  French,  260-261. 


Vanderwelde,  244,  339,  346. 
Victoria,  industrial    regulations    in, 

41. 

Vigo,  228. 
Violence  toward  non-unionists,  10, 

369-372. 

Volkstaat,  Die,  quoted,  302. 
Von  Oettingen,  99. 
Von  Treitschke,  99. 
Von  Vollmar,  306-307,  377. 
Vooruit     system    of    insurance    in 
Ghent,  328. 


394 


INDEX 


W 

Wage,  the  minimum,  working  out 
of  system  of,  in  Belgium,  329-330. 

Wages,  effect  of  foreigners  on,  20, 
344 ;  effect  of  the  negro  on,  28, 
344 ;  foreigners  imported  to  keep 
down,  48 ;  in  early  hard-time 
period,  83;  effect  of  inventions 
on,  182-184;  of  children  in  the 
South,  254;  necessity  for,  admit- 
ted by  Belgian  socialist,  377-378. 

Wagner,  Richard,  socialistic  opinions 
by,  157. 

Waldeck-Rousseau,  53. 

Walker,  Francis,  91. 

Walking-delegates,  34,  35 ;  as  sup- 
posed cause  of  labor  troubles, 
151 ;  disappearance  of  terrors  of, 
by  use  of  joint-agreement,  368. 

Wallace,  Graham,  247  n. 

Waring,  Colonel,  247. 

Waterworks,  public  ownership  of, 
112,  117-119. 

Wealth,  distribution  of,  in  United 
States,  163. 

"  Wealth  of  Nations,"  Adam  Smith's, 
263. 

Webb,  Sidney,  3,  107,  244. 

"Western  Civilization,"  Kidd's,56n. 


White,  Harry,  359. 

Whitten,  Dr.,  121-122. 

Windeyer,  Sir  William,  quoted,  104. 

Woltman,  L.,  304-305. 

Woman  question,  the,  97-98. 

Women,  strikes  by,  in  Massachu- 
setts (1834),  85;  higher  education 
of,  as  a  source  of  social  unrest, 
97-98 ;  in  Southern  factories,  253. 

Work,  restriction  of,  by  trade  unions, 
10. 

"  Workingmen's  Insurance,"  Wil- 
loughby's,  quoted,  214-215. 

Wright,  Carroll  D.,  on  railroads  and 
temperance,  176 ;  figures  of  suc- 
cessful strikes,  347;  statement 
that  trade  unions  oppose  strikes, 
356. 

Y 

"  Yeast,"  Kingsley's,  51  n. 

Youth  of  workmen  in  Western  shops, 


Zacher,  Dr.,  quoted  concerning  in- 
demnification for  accidents,  216. 

Zola,  171,  223. 

"Zu  Schutz  und  Trutz,"  Liebknecht's, 
300. 


Our  Benevolent  Feudalism 

By  W.  J.  GHENT 

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